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Clarke,  James  Freeman,  1810- 

1888. 
Orthodoxy 


ORTHODOlf : 


ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 


JAMES     FREEMAN    CLAEKE. 


"  Soleo  enim  in  aliena  castra  transire,  non  tanquum  transfuga,  sed  tanquain 
explorator."  —  Seneca,  EpistolcB,2. 

'"  Fiat  lux.  Cupio  refelli,  ubi  aberrSirim  ;  nihil  majus,  nihil  aliud  quam  Yeri- 
tatem  efflagito." — Thomas  Bcenet,  Arch.  Phil. 


SIXTH     EDITION. 

BOSTON: 

AMERICAN    UNITARIAN    ASSOCIATION. 
1869. 


^•^P   .  .    1986 


'^G'CAL  SEW\^^' 


iSi 


Entered,  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1866,  by  the 

AMKIUCAN  UNITARIAN   ASSOCIATION, 

in  the  Clerk's  Office  of  the  District  Court  of  the  District  of  Massachusetts. 


Stereotyped  at  the  Boston  Stereotype  Foundry, 
No.  4  Spring  Lane. 

Presswork  by  John  WUson  and  Son. 


PREFACE. 


The  Protestant  Reformation  has  its  Principle  and 
its  Method.  Its  Principle  is  Salvation  by  Faith,  not 
by  Sacraments.  Its  Method  is  Private  Judgment,  not 
Church  Authority.  But  private  judgment  generates 
authority  ;  authority,  first  legitimate,  that  of  knowledge, 
grows  into  the  illegitimate  authority  of  prescription, 
calling  itself  Orthodoxy.  Then  Private  Judgment  cornea 
forth  again  to  criticise  and  reform.  It  thus  becomes  the 
duty  of  each  individual  to  judge  the  Church ;  and  out 
of  innumerable  individual  judgments  the  insight  of  the 
Church  is  kept  living  and  progressive.  We  contribute 
one  such  private  judgment ;  not,  we  trust,  in  conceit, 
but  in  the  hope  of  provoking  other  minds  to  further 
examinations. 

(ill) 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER    I. 
INTRODUCTION. 


FAOB 

§  1.  Object  and  Character  of  this  Book.  ••.. , 1 

2.  Progress  requires  that  we  should  look  back  as  well  as  forward.   .  .  3 

3.  Orthodoxy  as  Right  Belief. 5 

4.  Orthodoxy  as  the  Doctrine  of  the  Majority.    Objections 7 

5.  Orthodoxy  as  the  Oldest  Doctrine.    Objections 9 

C.  Orthodoxy  as  the  Doctrine  held  by  all 10 

7.  Orthodoxy,  as  a  Formula,  not  to  be  found 10 

8.  Orthodoxy  as  Convictions  underlying  Opinions 11 

9.  Substantial  Truth  and  Formal  Error  in  all  great  Doctrinal  Systems.  13 

10.  Importance  of  this  Distinction .  ,  15 

11,  The  Orthodox  and  Liberal  Parties  in  New  England 17 


CHAPTER    II. 

THE   PRINCIPLE   AND   IDEA   OF  ORTHODOXY   STATED   AND 
EXAMINED. 

§  1.    The  Principle  of  Orthodoxy  defined • 19 

2.  Logical  Genesis  of  the  Principle  of  Orthodoxy 19 

3.  Orthodoxy  assumed  to  be  the  Belief  of  the  Majority 20 

4.  Heterodoxy  thus  becomes  sinful 20 

5.  The  Doctrine  of  Essentials  and  Non-essentials  leads  to  Rome.  ...  22 

6.  Fallacy  in  this  Orthodox  Argument 23 

7.  The  three  Tendencies  in  the  Church 26 

8.  The  Party  of  Works 28 

9.  The  Party  of  Emotion  in  Christianity 30 

10.  The  Faith  Party  in  Religion 31 

11.  Truth  in  the  Orthodox  Idea 31 

12.  Error  in  the  Orthodox  Principle 35 

13.  Faith,  Knowledge,  Belief,  Opinion 37 

a*  (V) 


VI  CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER    III. 

THE  ORTHODOX  IDEA  OF  NATURAL  AND  REVEALED  RELIGION; 
OR,  NATURALISM  AND  SUPERNATURALISM. 

§1.    Meaning  of  Natural  and  Supernatural 43 

2.  The  Creation  Supernatural 44 

3.  The  Question  stated 45 

4.  Argument  of  the  Supernaturallst  from  successive  Geologic  Creations.  45 

5.  Supernatural  Argument  from  Human  Freedom 47 

6.  Supernatural  Events  not  necessarily  Violations  of  Law 48 

7.  Life  and  History  contain  Supernatural  Events , 50 

8.  The  Error  of  Orthodox  Supernaturalism 50 

9.  No  Conflict  between  Naturalism  and  Supernaturalism 51 

10.  Further  Errors  of  Orthodox  Supernaturalism  —  Gulf  between  Chris- 

tianity and  all  other  Religions 54 

11.  Christianity  considered  unnatural  as  well  as  supernatural  by  being 

made  hostile  to  the  Nature  of  Man. 57 


CHAPTER    IV. 
TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS   AS   REGARDS   MIRACLES. 

§  1.    The  Subject  stated.    Four  Questions  concerning  Miracles 58 

2.  The  Definition  of  a  Miracle 58 

3.  The  different  Explanations  of  the  Miracles  of  the  Bible 61 

4.  Criticism  on  these  Different  Views  of  Miracles 66 

6.    Miracles  no  Proof  of  Cln-istianity 68 

6.  But  Orthodoxy  is  right  in  maintaining  tlieir  Reality  as  Historic  Facts.  74 

7.  Analogy  with  other  Similar  Events  recorded  in  History 76 

8.  Miracle  of  the  Resurrection.    Sceptical  Objections 80 

9.  Final  Result  of  this  Examination 85 


CHAPTER    V. 

ORTHODOX   IDEA    OF   THE    INSPIRATION    AND    AUTHORITY 
OF   THE  BIBLE. 

§  1.    Subject  of  this  Chapter.    Three  Views  concerning  the  Bible 87 

2.  The  Difficulty.    Antiquity  of  the  World,  and  Age  of  Mankind.    .   .  S9 

3.  Basis  of  the  Orthodox  Tlieory  of  Inspiration 94 

4.  Inspiration  in  general,  or  Natural  Inspiration 98 

5.  Christian  or  Supernatural  Inspiration ,  ,  101 

6.  Inspiration  of  the  Scriptures,  especially  of  the  New  Testament 

Scriptures 106 

7.  Authority  of  the  Scriptures 112 

8.  The  Christian  Prepossession 122 

9.  Conclusion 228 


CONTENTS.  Vii 

CHAPTER    VI. 
ORTHODOX  IDEA   OF   SIN,   AS   DEPRAVITY  AND   AS   GUILT. 

§  1.    The  Question  stated 130 

2.  The  four  Moments  or  Characters  of  Evil  —  the  Fall,  Natural  De- 

pravity, Total  Depravity,  Inability 130 

3.  Orthodox  and  Liberal  View  of  Man,  as  morally  diseased  or  other- 

wise   133 

4.  Sin  as  Disease 134 

6.    Doctrine  of  the  Fall  in  Adam,  and  Natural  Depravity  —  their  Truth 

and  Error 130 

6,  Examination  of  Romans,  5  :  12-21 HI 

7.  Orthodox  View  of  Total  Depravity  and  Inability HG 

5.  Proof  Texts 147 

9.    Truth  in  the  Doctrine  of  Total  Depravity 152 

10.  Ability  and  Inability 158 

11.  Orthodox  Doctrine  of  Inability lo3 

12.  Some  further  Features  of  Orthodox  Theology  concerning  human 

Sinfulness 166 

CHAPTER    VII. 

CONVERSION   AND   REGENERATION. 

§  1.    Orthodoxy  recognizes  only  two  Conditions  in  which  Man  can  be 

found 174 

2.  Crisis  and  Development 175 

3.  Nature  of  the  Change '.  .  176 

4.  Its  Reality  and  Importance 177 

5.  Isit  the  Work  of  God,  or  of  the  Man  himself?  Orthodox  Difficulty.  173 

6.  Solved  by  the  Distinction  between  Conversion  and  Regeneration.     .  178 

7.  Men  may  be  divided,  religiously  ,  .nto  three  Classes,  not  two.     ...  179 

8.  Difference  between  Conversion  and  Regeneration 181 

9.  Unsatisfactory  Attitude  of  the  Orthodox  Church 182 

10.  The  Essential  Thing  for  Man  is  to  repent  and  be  converted  ;  that  is, 

to  make  it  his  Purpose  to  obey  God  in  all  Things 185 

11.  Regeneration  is  God's  Work  in  the  Soul.    Examination  of  the  Clas- 

sical Passage,  or  Conversation  of  Jesus  with  Nicodemus.    .  .  .  ISO 

12.  Evidences  of  Regeneration ,  .  190 

CHAPTER    VIII. 
THE  ORTHODOX  IDEA  OF  THE   SON  i)F   GOD. 

§  1.    Orthodox  Doctrine  stated 202 

2.  This  Doctrine  gradually  developed 202 

3.  Unitarian  Objections 203 

4.  Substantial  Truth  in  this  Doctrine 204 

5.  Formal  Error  of  the  Orthodox  Statement 205 

6.  Errors  of  Arianisra  and  Naturalism 208 


VIU  CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER     IX. 
JUSTIFICATION   BY   FAITH. 

§1.  This  Doctrine  of  Paul  not  obsolete 210 

2.  Its  Meaning  and  Importance 212 

3.  Need  of  Justification  for  the  Conscience *  .  .  216 

4.  Reaction  of  Sin  on  the  Soul 218 

5.  Different  Methods  of  obtaining-  Forgiveness 220 

6.  Method  in  Christianity 222 

7.  Result 224 

8.  Its  History  in  the  Church 225 

9.  Orthodox  Errors,  at  the  present  Time,  in  Regard  to  Justification  by 

Faith 228 

10.    Errors  of  Liberal  Christiana 231 

CHAPTER    X. 
ORTHODOX   IDEA   OF   THE  ATONEMENT. 

§  1.  Confusion  in  the  Orthodox  Statement 235 

2.  Great  Importance  attributed  to  this  Doctrine 237 

3.  Stress  laid  on  the  Death  of  Jesus  in  the  Scripture 238 

4.  Difficulty  in  interpreting  these  Scripture  Passages 239 

5.  Theological  Theories  based  on  the  Figurative  Language  of  the  New 

Testament 240 

6.  The  three  principal  Views  of  the  Atonement  —  warlike,  legal,  and 

governmental 243 

7.  Impression  made  by  Christ's  Death  on  the  Minds  of  his  Disciples. 

First  Theory  on  the  Subject  in  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews.     .  .     243 

8.  Value  of  Suflcring  as  a  Means  of  Education 245 

9.  The  Human  Conscience  suggests  the  Need  of  some  Satisfaction  in 

order  to  our  Forgiveness 245 

10.  How  the  Death  of  Jesus  brings  Men  to  God 247 

11.  This  Law  of  Vicarious  Suffering  universal 251 

12.  This  Law  illustrated  from  History  —  in  the  Death  of  Soerates,  Joan 

of  Arc,  Savonarola,  and  Abraham  Lincoln 254 

13.  Dr.  Bushnell's  View  of  the  Atonement 259 

14.  Results  of  this  Discussion 260 

CHAPTER    XI. 
CALLING,    ELECTION,   AND   REPROBATION. 

§  1.  Orthodox  Doctrine 266 

2.  Scripture  Basis  for  this  Doctrine 269 

3.  Relation  of  the  Divine  Decree  to  Human  Freedom 271 

4.  History  of  the  Doctrine  of  Election  and  Predestination 272 

5.  Election  is  to  Work  and  Opportunity  here,  not  to  Heaven  hereafter. 

How  Jacob  was  elected,  and  how  the  Jews  were  a  Chosen  Peo- 
ple  ; 278 


CONTENTS.  IX 

0.    How  other  Nntions  were  elected  and  called 278 

7.  How  different  Denominntions  arc  elected 279 

8.  How  Individuals  are  elected 279 

9.  How  Jesus  was  elected  to  be  the  Christ 281 

10.    Other  Illustrations  of  Individual  Callin!?  and  Election 282 


CHAPTER    XII. 
IMMORTALITY  AND   THE   RESURRECTION. 

§  1.    Orthodox  Doctrine 285 

2.  TIic  Doctrine  of  Immortality  as  taught  by  Reason,  the  Instinctive 

Consciousness,  and  Scripture 280 

3.  The  Three  Principal  Views  of  Death— the  Tagan,  Jewish,  and 

Christian 289 

4.  Eternal  Life,  as  tnught  in  the  New  Testament,  not  endless  Future 

Existence,  but  present  Spiritual  Life 296 

5.  Resurrection,  and  its  real  Meaning,  as  a  Rising  up,  and  not  a  Rising 

again 304 

0.  Resurrection  of  the  Body,  as  taught  in  the  New  Testament,  not  a 
Rising  again  of  the  same  Body,  but  the  Ascent  into  a  higher 
Body 315 


CHAPTER    XIII. 

CHRIST'S  COMING,  USUALLY  CALLED  THE  «  SECOND  COMING," 
AND  CHRIST  THE  JUDGE  OF  THE  WORLD. 

§  1.    The  Coming  of  Christ  is  not  wholly  future,  not  wholly  outward,  not 

local,  nor  material 324 

2.  No  Second  Coming  of  Christ  is  mentioned  in  Scripture 325 

3.  Were  the  Apostles  mistaken  in  expecting  a  speedy  Coming  of  Christ  ?  326 

4.  Examination  of  the  Account  of  Christ's  coming  given  by  Jesus  in 

Matthew 328 

5.  Coming  of  Christ  in  Human  History  at  different  Times 333 

6.  Relation  of  the  Parable  of  the  Virgins,  and  of  the  Talents,  to  Christ's 

Coming 336 

7.  Relation  of  the  Account  of  the  Judgment  by  the  Messiah,  in  Matt. 

ch.  25,  to  his  Coming 337 

8.  How  Christ  is,  and  how  he  is  not,  to  judge  the  World 338 

9.  When  Christ's  Judgment  takes  Place 343 

10.  Paul's  View  of  the  Judgment  by  Christ 347 

11.  Final  Result 350 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER    XIV. 

ETERNAL  PUNISHMENT,  ANNIHILATION,  UNIVERSAL  RESTO- 
RATION. 


§  1.    Different  Views  concerning  tlie  Condition  of  the  Impenitent  here- 


after. 


352 


2.  The  Doctrine  of  Everlasting  Punishment,  as  held  by  the  Orthodox 

at  the  Present  Time 353 

3.  Apparent  Contradictions,  both  in  Scripture  and  Reason,  in  Regard 

to  this  Doctrine •^*52 

4.  Everlasting  Punishment  limits  the  Sovereignty  of  God 366 

5.  Everlasting  Punishment  contradicts  the  Fatherly  Love  of  God.    .  .  367 

6.  Attempts  to  modify  and  soften  the  Doctrine  of  Everlasting  Punish- 

ment   371 

7.  The  meaning  of  Eternal  Punishment  in  Scripture 375 

8.  How  Judgment  by  Christ  is  connected  with  Punishment 382 

9.  The  Doctrine  of  Annihilation 385 

10.    The  Doctrine  of  Universal  Restoration 386 


CHAPTER    XV. 
THE   CHRISTIAN   CHURCH. 

§  1.    The  Question  stated 391 

2.  Orthodox  Doctrine  of  the  Church  — Roman  Catholic  and  High 

Church 393 

3.  The  Protestant  Orthodox  Idea  of  the  Church 396 

4.  Christ's  Idea  of  a  Church,  or  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven 399 

6.    Church  of  the  Leaven,  or  the  Invisible  Church 403 

6.  The  Church  of  the  Mustard-seed 405 

7.  Primitive  and  Apostolic  Church,  or  Church  as  it  was 406 

8.  The  Actual  Church,  or  Church  as  it  is 410 

9.  The  Church  Ideal,  or  Church  as  it  ought  to  be 417 

10.    The  Church  Possible,  or  Church  as  it  can  be 419 

CHAPTER    XVI. 
THE  TRINITY. 

§1.    Definitionof  the  Church  Doctrine 423 

2.  History  of  the  Doctrine 426 

3.  Errors  in  the  Church  Doctrine  of  the  Trinity 428 

4.  The  Trinity  of  Manifestations  founded  in  the  Truth  of  Things.   .  .  432 

5.  It  is  in  Harmony  with  Scripture. 434 

6.  Practical  Value  of  the  Trinity,  when  rightly  understood 436 


CONTENTS.  XI 

APPENDIX. 

CRITICAL      NOTICES. 

§  1.    On  the  Defence  of  Nescience  in  Theology,  by  Herbert  Spencer  and 

Henry  L.  Mansel 441 

2.  On  the  Defence  of  Verbal  Inspiration,  by  Gaussen 449 

3.  Defence  of  tlje  Doctrine  that  Sin  is  a  Nature,  by  Professor  Shcdd.  .  455 

4.  Defence  of  Everlasting  Punishment,  by  Dr.  Nehemiah  Adams  and 

Dr.  J.  P.  Thompson 405 

5.  Defence  of  the  Trinity,  by  Frederick  D.  Huntington,  D.  D 480 


ORTHODOXY: 

ITS    TRUTHS   AND    ERRORS. 


CHAPTER    I. 

INTRODUCTION. 


§  1.  Object  and  Character  of  this  Booh. — The  peculiarity 
of  the  book  now  oflPered  to  the  religious  public  by  the  govern- 
ment of  the  American  Unitarian  Association,  is  this -^  that 
it  is  an  honest  attempt  to  find  and  state  the  truth  contained 
in  the  doctrines  of  their  opponents.  It  is,  perhaps,  something 
new  for  au  association  established  to  defend  certain  theo- 
logical opinions,  and  baptized  with  a  special  theological 
name,  to  publish  a  work  intended  to  do  justice  to  hostile  the- 
ories. The  too  usual  course  of  each  sect  has  been,  through 
all  its  organs,  to  attack,  denounce,  undervalue,  and  vilily 
the  positions  taken  by  its  antagonists.  This  has  been  con- 
sidered as  only  an  honest  zeal  for  truth.  The  consequence 
has  been,  that  no  department  of  literature  has  been  so  un- 
christian in  its  tone  and  temper  as  that  of  sectarian  contro- 
versy. Political  journals  heap  abuse  on  their  opponents,  in 
the  interest  of  their  party.  But  though  more  noisy  than  the 
theological  partisans,  they  are  by  no  means  so  cold,  hard, 
1  (»> 


2     orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

or  unrelenting.  Party  spirit,  compared  with  sectarian  spirit, 
seems  rather  mild.* 

It  is  true  that  theologians  do  not  now  use  in  controversy 
the  epithets  which  were  formerly  universal.  We  have 
grown  more  civil  in  our  language  than  were  our  "fathers. 
It  is  also  true  that  we  often  meet  with  theological  discussions 
conducted  in  a  spirit  of  justice  towards  one's  opponents,  f 
But  to  say,  " Fas  est  ab  hoste  doceri"  is  a  step  as  yet 
beyond  the  ability  of  most  controversialists.  To  admit 
that  your  antagonist  may  have  seen  some  truth  not  visible 
to  yourself,  and  to  read  his  work  in  this  sense,  —  in  order  to 
learn,  and  not  merely  to  confute,  —  is  not  yet  common. 

This  we  are  about  to  undertake  in  the  present  treatise. 
We  stand  in  the  Unitarian  position,  but  shall  endeavor  to 
see  if  there  be  not  some  truths  in  Orthodoxy  which  Unita- 
rians have  not  yet  adequately  recognized.  To  use  the  lan- 
guage of  our  motto  —  we  come  "not  as  deserters,  but  as 
explorers"  into  the  camp  of  Orthodoxy.  We  are  satisfied 
with  our  Unitarian  position,  as  a  stand-point  from  which  to 
survey  that  of  others.  And  especially  are  we  grateful  to  it, 
since  it  encourages  us  by  all  its  traditions,  by  all  its  ideas 

*  The  following  passage,  from  an  article  in  the  "  Independent,"  by  Henry 
Ward  Beecher,  is  valuable,  perhaps,  as  the  testimony  of  one  who  has  "  sum- 
■  mered  it  and  wintered  it  "  with  Orthodoxy :  — 

"  Does  anybody  inquire  why,  if  so  thinking,  we  occasionally  give  such  sharp 
articles  upon  the  great  religious  newspapers,  '  The  Observer,'  '  The  Intelli- 
gencer,' and  the  like  ?  O,  pray  do  not  think  it  from  any  ill  will.  It  is  all  kind- 
ness '.  We  only  do  it  to  keep  our  voice  in  practice.  We  have  made  Orthodoxy 
a  study.  And  by  an  attentive  examination  of  '  The  Presbyterian,' '  The  Ob- 
server,' '  The  Puritan  Recorder,'  and  such  like  unblemished  confessors,  we 
have  perceived  that  no  man  is  truly  sound  who  does  not  pitch  into  somebody 
that  is  not  sound ;  and  that  a  real  modern  orthodox  man,  like  a  nervous  watch 
dog,  must  sit  on  the  door-stone  of  his  system,  and  bark  incessantly  at  every- 
thing that  comes  in  sight  along  the  highway.  And  when  there  is  nothing  to 
bark  at,  either  he  must  growl  and  gnaw  his  reserved  bones,  or  bark  at  the  moon 
to  keep  up  the  sonorousness  of  his  voice.  And  so,  for  fear  that  the  sweetness 
of  our  temper  may  lead  men  to  think  that  we  have  no  theologic  zeal,  we  lift  up 
an  objurgation  now  and  then — as  much  as  to  say,  '  Here  we  are,  fierce  and 
orthodox  ;  ready  to  growl  when  we  cannot  bite.'  " 

t  Thus  Theodore  Parker  ("  Experience  as  a  Minister  ")  speaks  of  a  review 
of  his  "  Discourse  on  Religion  "  in  a  Trinitarian  work,  which  did  it  no  Injustice. 


INTRODUCTION.  8 

and  principles,  to  look  after  as  well  as  before  —  to  see  if 
there  be  no  truth  behind  us  which  we  have  dropped  in 
our  hasty  advance,  as  well  as  truth  beyond  us  to  which  we 
have  not  yet  attained. 

§  2.  Progress  requires  that  toe  should  look  back  as  well  as 
fonvard.  —  Such  a  study  as  this  may  be  undertaken  in  the 
interest  of  true  progress,  as  well  as  that  of  honest  inquiry. 
For  what  so  frequently  checks  progress,  causes  its  advocates 
to  falter,  and  produces  what  we  call  a  reaction  towards  the 
old  doctrines,  as  something  shallow  in  the  reform  itself? 
Christians  have  relapsed  into  Judaism,  Protestants  into  Ro- 
manism, Unitarians  into  Orthodoxy  —  because  something 
true  and  good  in  the  old  system  had  dropped  out  of  the  new, 
and  attracted  the  converts  back  to  their  old  home.  All  true 
progress  is  expressed  in  the  saying  of  Jesus,  "  I  have  not 
come  to  desti'oy,  but  to  fulfil."  The  old  system  cannot  pass 
away  until  all  its  truths  are  fulfilled,  by  being  taken  up  into 
the  new  system  in  a  higher  form.  Judaism  will  not  pass 
away  till  it  is  fulfilled  in  Christianity  —  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church  will  not  pass  away  till  it  is  fulfilled  in  Protestantism 
—  Orthodoxy  will  not  pass  away  till  it  is  fulfilled  by  Rational 
Christianity.  Judaism  continues  as  a  standing  protest,  on 
behalf  of  the  unity  of  God,  against  Trinitarianism. 

And  yet  we  believe  that,  in  the  religious  progi'ess  of  the 
race,  Christianity  is  an  advance  on  Judaism,  Protestant 
Christianity  an  advance  on  Roman  Catholic  Christianity, 
and  Liberal  and  Rational  Christianity  an  advance  on  Church 
Orthodoxy.  But  all  such  advances  are  subject  to  reaction 
and  relapse.  Reaction  differs  from  relapse  in  this,  that  it  is 
an  oscillation,  not  a  fall.  Reaction  is  the  backward  swing  of 
the  wave,  which  will  presently  return,  going  farther  for- 
ward than  before.  Relapse  is  the  fall  of  the  tide,  which 
leaves  the  ships  aground,  and  the  beach  uncovered.  Reac- 
tion is  going  back  to  recover  some  substantial  truth,  left  be- 
hind in  a  too  hasty  advance.     Relapse  is  falling  back  into 


4  ORTHODOXY  :    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

the  old  forms,  an  entire  apostasy  from  the  higher  stand-point 
to  the  lower,  from  want  of  strength  to  maintain  one's  self  in 
the  advande. 

The  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews  deserves  especial  study  by 
those  who  desire  to  understand  the  philosophy  of  intellectual 
and  spiritual  progress.  It  was  written  to  counteract  a  ten- 
dency among  the  Jewish  Christians  to  relapse  into  Juda- 
ism. These  Christians  missed  the  antiquity,  the  ceremony, 
the  authority  of  the  old  ritual.  Their  state  of  mind  resem- 
bled that  of  the  extreme  High  Church  party  in  the  Church 
of  England,  who  are  usually  called  Puseyites.  They  were 
not  apostates  or  renegades,  but  backsliders.  They  were 
always  lamenting  the  inferiority  of  Christianity  to  Judaism, 
in  the  absence  of  a  priesthood,  festival,  sacrifices.  It  hardly 
seemed  to  them  a  church  at  all.  The  Galatians,  to  whom 
Paul  wrote,  had  actually  gone  over  and  accepted  Jewish 
Christianity  in  the  place  of  Christianity  in  its  simplicity  and 
purity.  The  Hebrews  had  not  gone  over,  but  were  looking 
that  way.  Therefore  the  writer  of  the  Epistle  to  the  He- 
brews endeavors  to  show  them  that  all  which  was  really 
good  in  the  Jewish  priesthood,  temple,  ritual,  was  repre- 
sented in  Christianity  in  a  higher  form.  It  had  been  fulfilled 
in  the  New  Covenant.  Nothing  real  and  good  can  pass  away 
till  it  is  fulfilled  in  something  better.  Thus  the  Roman 
Catholic  Church  stands,  as  a  constant  proof  that  Protestant 
Christianity  yet  lacks  some  important  Christian  element 
which  Romanism  possesses.  Orthodoxy,  confuted,  as  we 
suppose,  over  and  over  again,  by  the  most  logical  argu- 
ments, stands  firm,  and  goes  forward. 

Let  us,  then,  reexamine  the  positions  of  our  antagonists  — 
not  now  merely  in  order  to  find  the  weak  places  in  their  line 
of  battle,  but  to  discover  the  strong  ones.  Let  us  see  if  there 
be  any  essential,  substantial  truth  in  this  venerable  system, 
to  which  we  have  as  yet  not  done  justice.  If  there  be,  justice 
and  progress  will  both  be  served  by  finding  and  declaring  it. 


INTRODUCTION.  5 

We  ask,  What  are  the  substantial  truths,  and  what  the  for- 
mal errors,  of  Orthodoxy  ?  But  what  do  we  mean  by  these 
terms  ? 

§  3.  Orthodoxy  as  Bight  Belief.  —  By  Orthodoxy  in  gen- 
eral is  meant  the  right  system  of  belief.  This  is  the  diction- 
ary definition.  But  as  the  world  and  the  Church  differ  as  to 
tchich  is  the  right  system  of  belief — as  there  are  a  vast  mul- 
titude of  systems  —  and  as  all  sects  and  parties,  and  all  men, 
believe  the  system  they  themselves  hold  to  be  the  right  be- 
lief—  Orthodoxy,  in  this  sense  of  right  belief,  means  nothing. 
In  this  sense  there  are  as  many  orthodoxies  as  there  are 
believers,  for  no  two  men,  even  in  the  same  Church,  think 
exactly  alike.  Unless,  therefore,  we  have  some  further  test, 
by  which  to  find  out  lohich  orthodoxy,  among  all  these  or- 
thodoxies, is  the  true  orthodoxy  —  we  accomplish  little  by 
giving  to  any  one  system  that  name. 

Here,  for  instance,  in  New  England,  we  have  a  system  of 
belief  which  goes  by  the  name  of  Orthodoxy ;  which,  how- 
ever, is  considered  very  heterodox  out  of  New  England. 
The  man  who  is  thought  sound  by  Andover  is  considered 
very  unsound  by  Princeton.  The  General  Assembly  of  the 
Presbyterian  Church,  in  1837,  cut  off  four  synods,  contain- 
ing some  forty  thousand  members,  because  they  were 
supposed  not  to  be  sound  in  doctrinal  belief.  But  these 
excommunicated  synods  formed  a  New  School  Presbyterian 
Church,  having  its  own  orthodoxy.  Andover  considers 
itself  more  orthodox  than  Cambridge  ;  but  the  New  School 
Presbyterians  think  themselves  more  orthodox  than  An- 
dover—  the  Old  School  Presbyterians  think  themselves 
more  orthodox  than  the  New  School.  But  the  most  ortho- 
dox Protestant  is  called  a  heretic  by  the  Roman  Catholics. 
The  Roman  Catholics,  again,  are  called  heretics  by  the  Greek 
Church.  So  that  orthodoxy,  in  this  sense,  seems  an  im- 
possible thing  —  something  which,  if  it  exists,  can  never  be 
certainly  ascertained. 
1* 


6  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

Whenever  a  body  of  believers  assumes  the  name  of  Ortho- 
dox, intending  thereby  that  they  are  right,  and  their  oppo- 
nents wrong,  they  evidently  assume  the  very  point  in  dispute. 
They  commit  the  fallacy  called  in  logic  a  petitio  principii. 
They  beg  the  question,  instead  of  discussing  it.  They  put 
will  in  the  place  of  reason.  They  say,  in  the  very  title  page 
of  their  book,  in  the  first  step  of  their  argument,  that  their 
book  is  satisfactory  and  their  argument  conclusive.  It  would 
be  more  modest  to  wait  till  the  discussion  is  concluded  be- 
fore they  proceed  thus  to  state  what  the  conclusion  is.  This 
is  an  arrogance  like  that  which  the  Church  of  Rome  com- 
mits, in  calling  itself  Catholic  or  Universal,  while  excluding 
more  than  half  of  Christendom  from  its  communion.* 

A  political  party  does  not  offer  such  an  affront  to  its 
opponents.  It  may  name  itself  Democratic,  Republican, 
Federal ;  it  may  call  itself  the  Conservative  party,  or  that 
of  Reform.  By  these  titles  it  indicates  its  leading  idea  —  it 
signifies  that  it  bears  the  standard  of  reform,  or  that  it  stands 
by  the  old  institutions  of  the  country.  But  no  political 
party  ever  takes  a  name  signifying  that  it  is  all  right  and  its 
opponents  all  wrong.  This  assumption  was  left  to  religious 
sects,  and  to  those  who  consider  humility  the  foundation  of 
all  the  virtues. 

The  term  "Evangelical"  is,  perhaps,  not  as  objectionable 
as  Orthodox,  though  it  carries  with  it  a  similar  slur  on  those 
of  other  beliefs.  It  says,  "  "We  are  they  who  believe  the 
gospel  of  Christ ;  those  who  differ  from  us  do  not  believe 
it."  It  is  like  the  assumption  by  some  of  the  Corinthians 
of  the  exclusive  name  of  Chi-istians.     "  We  are  of  Christ," 

*  According  to  the  "Chart  of  Religious  Belief"  in  Johnston's  Physical 
Atlas,  there  are  in  the  world  140,000,000  of  Catholics,  "9,000,000  of  Protestants, 
68,000,000  of  the  Greek  Church,  and  li.OOOjOOO  of  minor  creeds.  About,  in  his 
"  Question  Romaiue,"  gives  the  Roman  Church  139,000,000.  He  says,  "  The 
Iloman  Catholic  Church,  which  I  sincerely  respect,  is  composed  of  139}000,000 
of  individuals,  not  including  the  little  Mortara." 


INTRODUCTION.  7 

said  they  —  meaning  that  the  followers 'of  Paul  and  Apollos 
were  not  so. 

Probably  the  better  part  of  those  who  take  the  name  of 
Orthodox,  or  Evangelical,  intend  no  such  arrogance.  All 
they  want  is  some  word  by  which  to  distinguish  themselves 
from  Unitarians,  Universalists,  &c.  They  might  say,  "  We 
have  as  good  a  right  to  complain  of  your  calling  yourselves 
'  Rational  Christians '  or  '  Liberal  Christians '  —  assuming 
thereby  that  others  are  not  rational  or  liberal.  You  mean  no 
such  assumption,  perhaps  ;  neither  do  we  when  we  call  our- 
selves '  Orthodox '  or  '  Evangelical.'  When  we  can  find 
another  term,  better  than  these,  by  which  to  express  the 
difference  between  us,  we  will  use  it.  We  do  not  intend  by 
using  these  w'ords  to  foreclose  argument  or  to  beg  the  ques- 
tion. We  do  not  mean  by  Orthodoxy,  right  belief;  but 
only  a  certain  well-known  form  of  doctrifle." 

This  is  all  Avell.  Yet  not  quite  well  —  since  we  have 
had  occasion  to  notice  the  surprise  and  disgust  felt  by  those 
who  had  called  themselves  "  The  Orthodox,"  in  finding 
themselves  in  a  community  where  others  had  assumed  that 
title,  and  refused  to  them  any  share  in  it.  Therefore  it  is 
well  to  emphasize  the  declaration  that  Orthodoxy  in  the 
sense  of  "  right  belief"  is  an  unmeaning  expression,  sig- 
nifying nothing. 

§  4.  Orthodoxy  as  the  Doctrine  of  the  Majority.  Oh- 
jedions.  —  The  majority,  in  any  particular  place,  is  apt  to 
call  itself  orthodox,  and  to  call  its  opponents  heretics.  But 
the  majority  in  one  place  may  be  the  minority  in  another. 
The  majority  in  Massachusetts  is  the  minority  in  Virginia. 
The  majority  in  England  is  the  minority  in  Rome  or  Con- 
stantinople. The  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  the  Primate 
of  all  England,  gave  Mr.  Curzon  a  letter  of  introduction  to 
the  Patriarch  of  Constantinople,  the  head  of  the  Greek 
Church.  But  the  Patriarch  had  never  heard  of  the  Arch- 
bishop of  Canterbury,  and  inquired,  "  Who  is  he?" 


8     orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

Nevertheless,  it  is  a  very  common  argument  that  such  and 
such  a  doctrine,  being  held  by  the  great  majority  of  Chris- 
tians, must  necessarily  be  true.  Thus  it  is  said  that  since 
the  great  majority  of  Christians  believe  the  doctrine  of  the 
Trinity,  that  doctrine  must  be  true.  "  Is  it  possible,"  it  is 
said,  "  that  the  great  majority  of  Christian  believers  should 
be  now,  and  have  been  so  long,  left  in  error  on  such  a  funda- 
mental doctrine  as  this  ?  "  Even  so  intelligent  a  man  as  Dr. 
Huntington  seems  to  have  been  greatly  influenced  by  this 
argument  in  becoming  a  Trinitarian.  The  same  argument 
has  carried  many  Protestants  into  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church.  And,  no  doubt,  there  is  a  truth  in  the  argument  — 
a  truth,  indeed,  which  is  implied  all  through  the  present 
work  —  that  doctrines  thus  held  by  great  multitudes  during 
long  periods  cannot  be  wholly  false.  But  it  by  no  means 
proves  them  to  b^  wholly  true.  Otherwise,  truth  would 
change  as  the  majorities  change.  In  one  century  the  Arians 
had  the  majority ;  and  Arianism,  therefore,  in  that  century 
would  have  been  true.  Moreover,  most  of  those  who  adhere 
to  a  doctrine  have  not  examined  it,  and  do  not  have  any 
defined  opinion  concerning  it.  They  accept  it,  as  it  is  taught 
them,  without  reflection.  And  again,  most  truths  are,  at 
first,  in  a  minority  of  one.  Christianity,  in  the  first  cen- 
tury, was  in  a  very  small  minority.  Protestantism,  in  the 
time  of  Luther,  was  all  in  the  brain  and  heart  of  one  man. 
To  assume,  therefore,  that  Orthodoxy,  or  the  true  belief,  is 
that  of  the  majority,  is  to  forbid  all  progress,  to  denounce 
all  new  truth,  and  to  resist  the  revelation  and  inspiration  of 
Grod,  until  it  has  conquered  for  itself  the  support  of  the 
majority  of  mankind.  According  to  this  principle,  as  Chris- 
tianity is  still  in  a  minority  as  compared  with  paganism,  we 
ought  all  to  become  followers  of  Boodh.  Such  a  view  can- 
not bear  a  moment's  serious  examination.  Every  prophet, 
sage,  martyi',  and  heroic  champion  of  truth  has  spent  his 
life  and  won  the  admiration  and  grateful  love  of  the  world 


INTRODUCTION.  9 

by  opposing  the  majority  in  behalf  of  some  neglected  or 
unpopular  truth. 

§  5.  Orthodoxy  as  the  Oldest  Doctrine.  Objections.  —  Some 
people  think  that  Orthodoxy  means  the  oldest  doctrine,  and 
that  if  they  can  only  find  out  what  doctrine  was  believed  by 
the  Church  in  the  first  century,  they  shall  have  the  true 
orthodox  doctrine.  But  the  early  Church  held  some  opinions 
which  all  now  believe  to  be  false.  They  believed,  for  in- 
stance, that  Jesus  was  to  return  visibly,  in  that  age,  and  set 
up  his  church  in  person,  and  reign  in  the  world  in  outward 
form  —  a  thing  which  did  not  take  place.  They  therefore 
believed  in 'the  early  church  something  which  was  not  true 
—  consequently  what  they  believed  cannot  be  a  certain  test 
of  Orthodoxy. 

The  High  Church  party  in  the  Church  of  England,  in 
defending  themselves  against  the  Roman  Catholic  argument 
from  antiquity,  have  appealed  to  a  higher  antiquity,  and 
established  themselves  on  the  supposed  faith  of  the  first  three 
centuries.  But  Isaac  Taylor,  in  his  "  Ancient  Christianity," 
has  sufficiently  shown  that  during  no  period  in  those  early 
centuries  was  anything  like  modern  orthodoxy  satisfactorily 
established.*  The  Church  doctrine  was  developed  gradually 
during  a  long  period  of  debate  and  controversy.  The 
Christology  of  the  Church  was  elaborated  amid  .the  fierce 
conflicts  of  Arians  and  Athanasians,  Monothelites  and 
Monophysites,  Nestorians  and  Eutychians.  The  anthropol- 
ogy of  the  Church  was  hammered  and  beaten  into  shape  by 
the  powerful  arm  of  Augustine  and  his  successors,  on  the 
anvils  of  the  fifth  century,  amid  the  fiery  disputes  of  Pela- 
gians, Semi-Pelagians,  and  their  opponents. 

Many  doctrines  generally  believed  in  the  earlji  church  are 

*  Mr.  Taylor  shows  that  the  Church,  A.  D.  300,  was  essentially  corrupt  in 
doctrine  and  practice ;  that  the  Romish  Church  was  rather  an  improvement  on 
it;  that  Jerome,  Ambrose,  Gregory,  and  Athanasius  are  full  of  false  doctrine; 
and  that  a  Gnostic  theology,  a  Pagan  asceticism,  and  a  corrupt  morality  pre- 
vailed in  the  Church  in  those  early  centuries 


10      ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

universally  rejected  now.  The  doctrine  of  cbiliasm,  or  the 
millennial  reign  of  Christ  on  earth ;  the  doctrine  of  the 
under  world,  or  Hades,  where  all  souls  went  after  death  ; 
the  doctrine  of  the  atonement  made  by  Christ  to  the  devil, 
—  sucli  were  some  of  the  prevailing  views  held  in  the  early 
ages  of  the  Church.  The  oldest  doctrine  is  not  certainly 
the  truest ;  or,  as  Theodore  Parker  once  said  to  a  priest  iu 
Rome,  who  told  him  that  the  primacy  of  Peter  was  asserted 
in  the  second  century,  "  A  lie  is  no  better  because  it  is  an 
old  one." 

§  6.  Orthodoxy  as  the  Doctrine  held  by  all.  —  But,  it  may 
be  said,  if  Orthodoxy  does  not  mean  the  absolutely  right 
system  of  belief,  nor  the  system  held  by  the  majority, 
nor  the  oldest  doctrine  of  the  Church,  it  may,  nevertheless, 
mean  the  essential  truths  held  in  all  Christian  Churches,  in 
all  ages  and  times ;  in  short,  according  to  the  ancient  for- 
mula—  that  which  has  been  believed  always,  by  all  persons, 
and  everywhere  —  ^^  quod  semper,  quod  ah  omnibus^  quod 
ubique." 

In  this  sense  no  one  would  object  to  Orthodoxy.  Only 
make  your  Catholicity  large  enough  to  include  every  one, 
and  who  would  not  be  a  Catholic  ?  But  this  famous  defini- 
tion, if  it  be  strictly  taken,  seems  as  much  too  large  as 
the  others  are  too  narrow.  If  you  only  admit  to  be  ortho- 
dox what  all  Christian  persons  have  believed,  then  the  Trinity 
ceases  to  be  orthodox ;  for  many,  in  all  ages,  have  disbe- 
lieved it.  Eternal  punishment  is  not  orthodox,  for  that,  too, 
has  often  been  denied  in  the  Church.  Sacraments  are  not 
orthodox,  for  the  Quakers  have  rejected  them.  The  resur- 
rection is  not  orthodox,  for  there  were  some  Christians  in 
the  Church  at  Corinth  who  said  there  was  no  resurrection 
of  the  dead. 

§  7.  Orthodoxy,  as  a  Formula,  not  to  he  found.  —  Any 
attempt,  therefore,  rigidly  to  define  Orthodoxy,  destroys  it. 
Regarded  as  a  pi'ecise  statement,  in  a  fixed  or  definite  form, 


INTRODUCTION.  11 

it  is  an  impossibility.  There  is  uo  such  thing,  and  ucvlt 
has  been.  No  creed  ever  made  satisfied  even  the  majority. 
How,  indeed,  can  any  statement  proceeding  from  the  hvmian 
brain  be  an  adequate  and  permanent  expression  of  eternal 
truth?  Even  the  apostle  says,  "I  know  in  part,  and  I 
prophesy  in  part,  but  when  that  which  is  perfect  is  come,  then 
that  which  is  in  part  shall  be  done  away."  The  apostle 
declares  that  his  sight  of  truth  is  only  partial,  and  that 
everything  partial  is  imperfect,  and  that  everything  imperfect 
must  pass  away ;  so  that  our  present  knowledge  of  truth  is 
transient.  "Whether  there  be  knowledge,  it  shall  pass 
away."  If  the  apostle  Paul  declared  that  he  had  not  the 
power  of  making  a  perfect  and  permanent  statement  of  truth, 
how  can  Ave  believe  that  any  one  else  can  ever  do  it  ? 

§  8.  Orthodoxy,  as  Convictions  underlying  Opinions.  —  If, 
therefore,  every  doctrinal  statement  is  changeable  and 
changing ;  if  the  history  of  opinions  shows  the  rise  and 
fall  of  creeds,  —  one  after  the  other  becoming  dominant, 
and  then  passing  away ;  if  no  formula  has  ever  gained  the 
universal  assent  of  Christendom ;  if  the  oldest  creeds  con- 
tained errors  now  universally  rejected,  —  what  then  remains 
as  Orthodoxy  ?  We  answer,  no  one  statement,  but  something 
underlying  all  statements  —  no  one  system  of  theology,  but 
certain  convictions,  perhaps,  pervading  all  the  ruling  sys- 
tems. Man's  mind,  capable  of  insight,  sees  with  the  inward 
eye  the  same  great  spiritual  realities,  just  as  with  his  out- 
ward eye  he  sees  the  same  landscape,  sky,  ocean.  Accord- 
ing to  the  purity  and  force  of  his  insight,  and  the  depth  of 
his  experience,  he  sees  the  same  truth.  There  is  one  truth, 
but  many  ways  of  stating  it  —  one  spirit,  but  many  forms. 

"  The  one  remains,  the  many  change  and  pass  ; 
Heaven's  light  forever  shines,  earth's  shadows  fly." 

Are  there  any  such  great  convictions  underlying  and  in- 
forming all  the  creeds?     I  think  there  are.     I  think,  for 


12      ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

example,  it  has  always  been  believed  in  the  Church  that  in 
some  sense  man  is  a  sinner,  and  in  some  sense  Christ  is  a 
Saviour  from  sin ;  that  Christianity  is  in  some  way  a  super- 
natural revelation  of  the  divine  Avill  and  love  ;  that  Scripture 
is  somehow  an  inspired  book,  and  has  authority  over  our 
belief  and  life  ;  that  there  is  a  Church,  composed  of  disciples 
of  Jesus,  whose  work  in  the  world  is  to  aid  him  in  saving 
the  lost  and  helping  the  fallen  and  wretched ;  that  some- 
how man  needs  to  be  changed  from  his  natural  state  into  a 
higher  state,  and  to  begin  a  new  life,  in  order  to  see  God ; 
that  there  is  such  a  thing  as  heaven,  and  such  a  thing  as 
hell ;  that  those  who  love  God  and  man  belong  to  heaven, 
and  that  the  selfish  and  sensual  belong  to  hell.  These  ideas 
have  been  the  essential  ideas  of  the  Church,  and  constitute  ■ 
the  essence  of  its  Orthodoxy. 

Orthodoxy,  then,  is  not  any  definite  creed,  or  statement  of 
truth.  It  is  not  of  the  letter,  but  of  the  spirit.  The  letter 
kills.  Consequently  those  who  cling  to  the  letter  of  Ortho- 
doxy kill  its  spirit.  The  greatest  enemy  of  Orthodoxy  is 
dead  Orthodoxy.  The  old  statements  retained  after  their 
life  is  gone,  —  the  old  phrases  made  Shibboleths  by  which 
truth  is  to  be  forever  tested,  —  these  gradually  make  the 
whole  system  seem  false  to  the  advancing  intellect  of  the 
human  race.  Then  heresies  come  up,  just  as  providential, 
and  just  as  necessary,  as  Orthodoxy,  to  compel  the  Church 
to  make  restatements  of  the  eternal  truth.  Heresies,  in  this 
sense,  are  as  true  as  Orthodoxy,  and  make  part,  indeed,  of 
a  higher  Orthodoxy. 

By  Orthodoxy,  therefore,  we  do  not  mean  the  opinions 
held  by  any  particular  denomination  in  New  England  or 
elsewhere.  We  do  not  mean  the  opinions  of  New  England 
Calvinists  or  of  Southern  Presbyterians ;  not  the  creed  of 
Andover,  of  New  Haven,  or  of  Princeton  :  but  we  mean  that 
great  system  of  belief  which  gradually  took  form  in  the 
Christian  Church,  in  the  course  of  centuries,  as  its  standard 


INTRODUCTION.  13 

theology.  The  pivotal  points  of  this  system  are  sin  and  sal- 
vation. In  it  man  appears  as  a  sinner,  and  Christ  as  a 
Saviour,  Man  is  saved  by  an  inward  change  of  heart,  re- 
sulting in  an  outward  change  of  life,  and  produced  by  the 
sight  of  the  two  facts  of  sin  and  salvation.  The  sight  of  his 
sin  and  its  consequences  leads  him  to  repentance ;  the  sight 
of  salvation  leads  him  to  faith,  hope,  and  love  ;  and  the  sight 
of  both  results  in  regeneration,  or  a  new  life.  This  system 
also  asserts  the  divinity  of  Christ,  the  triune  nature  of  God, 
the  divine  decrees,  the  plenary  inspiration  of  Scripture, 
eternal  punishment,  and  eternal  life. 

§  9.  Substantial  Truth  and  Formal  Error  in  all  great 
Doctrinal  Systems.  —  Within  the  last  twenty-five  years,  a 
new  department  of  theological  literature  has  arisen  in  Ger- 
many, which  treats  of  the  history  of  doctrines.  The  ob- 
ject of  this  is  to  trace  the  doctrinal  opinions  held  in  the 
Church  in  all  ages.  By  this  course  of  study,  two  facts 
are  apparent — first,  that  the  same  great  views  have  been 
substantially  held  by  the  majority  of  Christians  in  all  ages  ; 
and,  secondly,  that  the  forms  of  doctrine  have  been  very 
difierent.  The  truths  themselves  have  been  received  by 
Christians,  as  their  strength,  their  hope,  and  their  joy,  in  all 
time  ;  but  the  formal  statement  of  these  truths  has  been 
wrought  out  diiFerently  by  individual  intellects.  .The  uni- 
versal body  of  Christians  has  taken  care  of  Christian  truth ; 
while  the  Church  Fathers,  or  doctors,  have  held  in  their 
hands  the  task  of  defining  it  doctrinally  for  the  intellect. 

By  substantial  truth  we  mean  this  —  that  in  all  the 
great  systems  of  opinion  which  have  had  a  deep  hold  on  the 
human  mind,  over  broad  spaces  and  through  long  periods, 
there  is  something  suited  to  man's  nature,  and  corresponding 
with  the  facts  of  the  case.  The  mind  of  man  was  made  for 
truth,  and  not  for  error.  Error  is  transient :  truth  only  is 
permanent.  Men  do  not  love  error  for  its  own  sake,  but  for 
the  sake  of  something  with  which  it  is  connected.  After  a 
2 


14  ORTHODOXY  :    ITS    TRUTHS    AND    ERRORS. 

while,  errors  are  eliminated,  and  the  substance  retained.  The 
great,  universal,  abiding  convictions  of  men  must,  therefore, 
contain  truth.  If  it  were  not  so,  we  might  well  despair  ;  for, 
if  the  mind  of  the  race  could  fall  into  unmixed  error,  the 
only  remedy  by  which  the  heart  can  be  cured,  and  the  life 
redeemed  from  evil,  would  be  taken  away.  But  it  is  not  so. 
God  has  made  the  mind  for  truth,  as  he  has  adapted  the  taste 
to  its  appropriate  food.  In  the  main,  and  in  the  long  run, 
what  men  believe  is  the  truth;  and  all  catholic  beliefs  are 
valid  beliefs.  Opinions  held  by  all  men,  everywhere  and  at 
all  times,  must  be  substantially  true. 

But  error  certainly  exists,  and  always  has  existed.  If  the 
human  mind  is  made  for  truth,  how  does  it  fall  into  error? 
There  never  has  been  any  important  question  upon  which 
men  have  not  taken  two  sides  ;  and,  where  they  take  two 
sides,  one  side  must  be  in  error.  Sometimes  these  two  par- 
ties are  equally  balanced,  and  that  for  long  periods.  With 
which  has  the  truth  been  ?  Is  God  always  with  the  majori- 
ty? If  so,  we  must  at  once  renounce  our  Unitarian  belief 
for  the  Trinity,  as  an  immense  majority  of  votes  are  given 
in  its  favor.  But,  then,  we  must  also  renounce  Protestantism  ; 
for  Protestantism  has  only  eighty  or  ninety  millions  against 
a  hundred  and  forty  millions  who  are  Catholics.  And,  still 
further,  we  must  renounce  Christianity  in  favor  of  Heathen- 
ism ;  since  all  the  different  Christian  sects  and  churches 
united  make  up  but  three  hundred  millions,  while  the  Buddh- 
ists alone  probably  exceed  that  number.  Moreover,  truth 
is  always  in  a  minority  at  first,  —  usually  in  a  minority  of 
one  ;  and,  if  men  ought  to  wait  until  it  has  a  majority  on  its 
side  before  they  accept  it,  it  never  will  have  a  majority  on 
its  side. 

These  objections  lead  us  to  the  only  possible  answer,  which 
consists  in  distinguishing  between  the  substance  and  the  form. 
When  we  assert  that  all  creeds,  widely  held  and  long  re- 
tained, have  truth,  we  mean  substantial  truth.     We  do  not 


INTRODUCTION.  15 

mean  that  they  are  true  in  their  formal  statement,  which 
may  be  an  erroneous  statement,  but  that  they  are  true  as  to 
their  contents.  The  substance  of  the  belief  is  the  fact  in- 
wardly beheld  by  the  mind  ;  the  form  is  the  verbal  statement 
which  the  mind  makes  of  what  it  has  seen.  It  has  seen 
something  real ;  but,  when  it  attempts  to  describe  what  it 
has  seen,  it  may  easily  commit  errors.  Thus  there  may  be, 
in  the  same  creed,  substantial  truth  and  formal  error ;  and 
all  great  and  widely-extended  beliefs,  as  we  assert,  must  con- 
tain substantial  truth  and  formal  error.  Without  substantial 
truth,  there  would  be  nothing  in  them  to  feed  the  mind,  and 
they  would  not  be  retained ;  and,  if  they  were  not  more  or 
less  erroneous  in  form,  it  would  imply  infallibility  on  the 
part  of  those  w^ho  give  them  their  form. 

§  10.  Importance  of  this  Distinction. — This  distinction  is 
one  of  immense  importance  ;  because,  being  properly  appre- 
hended, it  Avould,  by  destroying  dogmatism,  destroy  bigotry 
also.  Dogmatism  consists  in  assuming  that  the  essence  of 
truth  lies  in  its  formal  statement.  Correctly  assuming 
that  the  life  of  the  soul  comes  from  the  sight  of  truth,  it 
falsely  infers  that  the  essence  of  truth  is  in  the  verbal 
formula.  Consequently,  this  formula  must  necessarily 
seem  of  supreme  importance,  and  the  very  salvation  of  the 
soul  to  depend  on  holding  the  correct  opinion.  With  this 
conviction,  one  must  and  ought  to  be  bigoted ;  he  ought  to 
cling  to  the  minutest  syllable  of  his  creed  as  the  drowning 
man  clings  to  the  floating  plank.  Holding  this  view,  we 
cannot  blame  men  for  being  bigoted :  it  is  their  duty  to  be 
bigoted.  But,  when  the  distinction  is  recognized,  they  will 
cling  to  the  substance,  knowing  that  the  vital  truth  lies  there. 
It  is  the  sight  of  the  fact  which  is  the  source  of  our  life,  and 
not  the  statement  which  we  make,  in  words,  .as  to  Avhat 
we  have  seen.  Then  the  sight  becomes  the  thing  of  immense 
importance  ;  the  creed  in  which  it  is  expressed,  of  compara- 
tive unimportance. 


16  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

This  distinction  would  tend  to  bring  the  Church  to  a  true 
unity  —  the  unity  of  the  spirit.  All  would  strive  for  the 
same  insight,  all  tolerate  variety  of  expression.  Instead  of 
assenting  outwardly  to  the  same  creed,  every  man  ought,  in 
fact,  to  make  his  own  creed ;  and  there  should  be  as  many 
different  creeds  as  there  are  different  men.  Nor  should  my 
creed  of  to-day  be  the  same  as  that  of  yesterday ;  for,  in- 
stead of  resting  on  a  past  experience,  I  should  continually 
endeavor  to  obtain  new  sights  of  the  one  unchangeable  truth. 
Seeing  more  of  it  to-day  than  I  did  yesterday,  my  yester- 
day's creed  would  seem  inadequate,  and  I  should  wish  to 
make  a  new  one. 

Substantial  truth  means  the  truth  which  we  see  —  the 
inward  sight,  the  radical  experience.  Formal  truth  is  the 
verbal  statement,  and  consists  in  accuracy  of  expression. 
And  so  of  error.  Substantial  error  means  error  in  regard 
to  the  substance,  and  is  necessarily  inadequacy  of  inward 
experience.  Strictly  speaking,  there  cannot  be  substantial 
error  ;  for  error,  in  regard  to  the  substance  of  truth,  is  purely 
negative.  It  is  not-seeing.  It  is  failing  to  perceive  the 
truth,  either  from  want  of  opportunity,  weakness  of  vision, 
or  neglect  in  looking.  But  formal  error  is  not  merely 
defect :  it  may  also  be  mistake.  We  may  misstate  the 
truth,  and  say  what  is  radically  false.  From  this  source  come 
contradictions ;  and,  where  two  statements  are  contradic- 
tory, both  cannot  be  true.  Falsehood,  therefore,  originates 
with  the  statement.  The  errors  of  insight  are  merely 
defects ;  but  the  errors  of  statement  may  be  positive  false- 
hoods. 

This  leads  us  to  take  a  special  view  of  theological  contro- 
versies. In  all  great  controversies,  in  the  conflicts  of  ages, 
where  the  good  and  wise  have  stood  opposed  to  each  other, 
century  after  century,  it  is  probable  that  there  are  truth  and 
error  on  both  sides. 

Each  side  may  hold  some  truth  which  the  other  has  not 


INTRODUCTION.  17 

seen.  There  is,  therefore,  also  substantial  error  on  both 
sides  ;  for  each  may  have  failed  to  see  some  phase  of  truth 
which  the  other  has  recognized.  But  there  may  be  formal 
error,  or  error  of  statement,  even  where  there  is  substantial 
truth ;  for  the  truth  may  be  overstated,  or  understated,  or 
misstated,  and  a  false  expression  given  to  a  true  observation. 

"What,  then,  is  the  duty  of  those  who  stand  opposed  to 
each  other  in  these  controversies  —  of  Catholics  and  Protes- 
tants, Christians  and  Deists,  Orthodox  and  Unitarians  ?  They 
have  plainly  a  twofold  duty  to  themselves  as  well  as  to  their 
opponents.  They  ought  to  increase  their  insight,  and  to 
improve  their  statements  ;  to  deepen  and  widen  their  hold 
of  the  substance  ;  to  correct  and  improve  their  expression  of 
the  form.  The  first  is  the  Avork  of  religion  ;  the  second, 
that  of  theology. 

The  first  is  infinitely  the  most  important,  because  the  life 
of  the  soul  depends  on  the  sight  of  truth.  This  is  its  food, 
without  which  it  will  starve  and  die.  But  it  is  also  impor- 
tant that  it  should  improve  its  theology,  because  a  correct 
theology  is  a  help  to  insight,  and  a  ground  of  mental  com- 
munion. 

§  11.  The  Orthodox  and  Liberal  Parties  in  New  England. 
—  The  Liberal  party  in  New  England  have  carried  on  a 
theological  controversy  for  some  forty  years  with  the  Ortho- 
dox. This  controversy  Avas  inevitable.  Calvinism  had 
neglected  important  truths  which  the  human  soul  needed, 
and  without  which  it  would  starve.  Unitarianism  came  to 
assert  and  vindicate  those  truths.  At  first,  it  was  inevitable 
that  the  statements  on  either  side  should  be  narrow  and 
mutually  exclusive.  But,  as  a  battle  goes  on,  the  position 
of  the  opposing  armies  changes.  The  points  of  attack  and 
defence  alter.  Old  positions  are  abandoned,  and  new  ones 
occupied.  Seldom  does  it  happen  to  either  army  to  sleep  on 
the  field  of  battle.  Nor  has  it  so  happened  to  us.  Neither 
the  Unitarians  nor  the  Trinitarians  have  gained  a  com- 
2* 


18      ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

plete  victory :  each  has  taken  some  important  position, 
and  yielded  some  other.  We  have  a  book  called  "  Conces- 
sions of  Trinitarians  :  "  another  might  be  written  containing 
the  "Concessions  of  Unitarians."  Neither  side  has  con- 
ceded, or  ought  to  concede,  any  real  truth  of  experience  or 
of  statement ;  but  it  is  honorable  to  each  to  concede  its  own 
partial  and  inadequate  statements. 

We  intend,  in  this  volume,  to  endeavor,  from  our  own 
point  of  view,  to  gain  what  sight  we  can  of  the  radical,  vital 
truth  underlying  each  great  Orthodox  doctrine.  At  the 
same  time,  we  shall  freely  criticise  the  forms,  especially  the 
more  recent  ones,  in  which  Orthodox  doctrines  have  been 
stated. 

We  assume,  at  the  outset,  that  each  doctrine  does  cover 
some  truth  of  experience,  some  real  solid  fact,  which  is  as 
important  to  us  as  to  our  opponents.  We  assume,  that, 
though  the  doctrines  may  be  false,  there  may  be  an  expe- 
rience behind  them  which  is  true.  We  have  satisfied  our- 
selves of  the  formal  error  of  their  statements.  We  consider 
it  impossible  for  a  sound  Unitarian  intellect  to  accept  the 
Orthodox  theology  as  a  whole,  without  being  untrue  to  itself ; 
but  there  is  no  reason  why  we  should  not  break  this  shell 
of  doctrine,  and  find  the  vital  truths  which  it  contains.  And 
if  it  be  said,  "  Who  made  you  a  judge  or  a  divider  on  these 
subjects  ?  "  we  reply,  that  only  by  contributions  from  all  quar- 
ters can  a  final  judgment  be  reached.  Meantime,  it  is  the 
right  and  duty  of  every  serious  thinker  to  add  his  own  opin- 
ion to  the  common  stock  ;  willing  to  be  refuted  when  wrong, 
—  glad,  if  right,  to  be  helpful  in  any  degree  towards  the  ulti- 
mate result. 

This  is  the  object  of  the  present  work,  which,  though 
written  By  a  Unitarian,  and  from  a  Unitarian  stand-point, 
and  though  published  by  the  American  Unitarian  Associa- 
tion, will,  we  trust,  be  sufficiently  unsectarian. 


THE  PRINCIPLE  OF  ORTHODOXY   EXAMINED.  19 


CHAPTER    II. 

THE  PRINCIPLE  AND  IDEA  OF  ORTHODOXY  STATED  AND 
EXAMINED. 

§»1.  Tlie  Principle  of  Orthodoxy  defined.  —  The  principle 
of  Orthodoxy  is,  that  there  is  one  true  system  of  Christian 
docti'ine,  and  that  all  others  are  false  ;  thafthis  system  can 
be,  and  has  been,  so  stated  in  words  as  to  distinguish  it  from 
all  the  false  systems  or  heresies ;  and  that  this  true  system 
of  doctrine  is  the  one  which  is  now  held,  and  always  has  been 
held,  by  the  majority  of  Christians  ;  and,  finally,  that  the  be- 
lief of  this  system  is,  as  a  rule,  essential  to  salvation  —  so  that 
those  who  may  be  saved,  while  not  accepting  it,  will  be  saved 
(if  at  all)  by  way  of  exception,  and  not  according  to  rule. 

§  2.  Logical  Genesis  of  the  Principle  of  Orthodoxy.  —  The 
principle  of  Orthodoxy  seems  to  have  arisen,  and  to  have 
maintained  itself  in  the  Church,  in  some  such  way  as  this. 
Jesus  Christ,  it  is  assumed,  came  to  save  the  soul  from  sin 
and  evil.  He  saves  the  soul  by  the  word  of  truth.  In 
order  that  this  truth  shall  become  saving  truth,  it  must  be 
believed,  and  so  strongly  believed  as  to  have  a  practical 
influence  on  life  and  action.  We  are  therefore  saved  by 
believing  the  truth  taught  by  Christ.  But  in  order  to  be 
believed,  it  must  be  expressed  in  some  definite  statement,  or 
in  what  we  call  Christian  doctrine.  But  truth  is  one,  and 
therefore  the  doctrine  which  expresses  it  must  also  be  one. 

Therefore  there  must  be  one  system  of  Christian  doctrine, 
containing  in  itself  the  substance  of  Christian  truth,  and  con- 
stituting the  object  of  Christian  faith.  This  system,  though 
it  may  vary  in  its  vmessential  parts,  must  in  its  essence  be 


20      ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

unchangeable.  In  proportion  as  any  system  of  belief  varies 
from  it,  such  system  is  heterodox  and  dangerous,  while  this 
system  alone  is  orthodox  and  safe. 

Another  form  of  this  argument  would  be  as  follows : 
Christ  came  to  reveal  something  to  men.  If  revealed,  it 
must  be  made  known.  If  made  known,  it  must  be  capable 
of  being  so  expressed  that  there  can  be  no  reasonable  doubt 
concerning  it.  Otherwise,  Christianity  would  not  be  a  reve- 
lation. But  if  expressed  so  as  to  enter  the  human  mind,  it 
must  be  expressed  in  hnman  language.  A  verbal  revelaihon, 
therefore,  is  essential  for  the  purposes  of  Christianity.  Such 
a  revelation  is  tiQthing  elge  than  a  system  of  doctrine,  or 
that  which  can  be  systematized  into  doctrine.  And  this  sys- 
tem must  be  one  and  the  same  from  age  to  age,  or  it  is  not  a 
permanent  divine  revelation,  but  only  a  transient  human 
seeking  for  such  a  revelation. 

§  3.  Orthodoxy  assumed  to  he  the  Belief  of  the  Majority.  — 
The  natural  test  of  Orthodoxy  is  assumed  to  be  the  belief  of 
the  majority  of  Christians  ;  for  if  Christianity  be  a  revelation 
of  truth,  its  essential  contents  must  be  easy  to  apprehend,  and 
when  apprehended,  they  must  be  generally  accepted.  The 
revelations  of  God  in  nature  are  seen  and  accepted  by  the 
human  intellect,  and  so  become  matters  of  science.  Orthodox 
^science  is  that  which  the  great  majority  of  scientific  men  have 
accepted  as  such  ;  and  Orthodox  Christianity^  in  like  manner, 
must  be  that  which  the  majority  of  Christian  believers  accept 
as  such.  Hence  it  is  taken  for  granted,  as  regards  Ortho- 
dox doctrine,  that  it  meets  the  test,  "  Quod  semper,  quod 
ubique,  quod  ab  omnibus." 

§  4.  Heterodoxy  thus  becomes  sinful.  —  But  if  the  essential 
truth  of  Christianity  be  thus  plain,  those  who  do  not  receive 
it  must  be  either  stupid  or  wilful.  Its  rejection  argues  a 
want  of  intellect  or  a  bad  heart.  Heretics,  therefore,  ought 
logically  to  become  to  the  Orthodox  objects  either  of  con- 
tempt or  hatred.     If  they  cannot  see  what  is  so  plain,  they 


THE   PRINCIPLE   OP   ORTHODOXY    EXAMINED.  21 

must  be  intellectually  imbecile.  If  they  will  not  see  it,  they 
must  be  morally  depraved.  Therefore  intelligent  people 
who  accept  and  teach  heresies  ought  to  be  considered  wicked 
people  by  logical  Orthodox  minds.  Moreover,  they  are  the 
most  dangerous  persons  in  the  community,  because,  by  deny- 
ing that  truth  by  which  the  soul  is  to  be  saved,  they  endanger 
not  merely  the  temporal,  but  also  the  eternal,  welfare  c>f  those 
whom  they  seduce.  And  if  we  have  a  right  to  abate  a  nui- 
sance which  only  interferes  with  the  earthly  comfort  and  peace 
of  society,  how  much  more  one  which  attacks  its  spiritual 
peace  and  eternal  welfare  !  Have  not  the  majority  a  right  to 
protect  themselves,  their  children,  and  society  from  that  which 
they  not  merely  believe,  but  know,  to  be  evil  ?  For  Ortho- 
doxy assumes  to  be  not  merely  opinion,  but  knowledge. 
Hence  Orthodoxy  legitimates  persecution.*  Persecution  is 
only  the  judicious  repression  of  criminal  attempts  to  pervert 
and  injure  society.  Moreover,  Orthodoxy,  according  to  its 
principle,  ought  to  discourage  inquiry  in  relation  to  its  own 
fundamental  principles.  For  why  continue  to  discuss  and 
debate  about  that  which  is  known  ?  Progress  consists  in  ad- 
vancing from  the  known  to  the  unknown.  The  unknown, 
and  not  the  known,  is  the  proper  subject  for  inquiry.  The 
system  of  Orthodoxy,  therefore,  according  to  its  own  princi- 
ple, should  be  withdrawn  from  further  examination.  Intel- 
lectual advance  requires  us  to  take  for  granted  something  —  to 


*  Of  course  we  do  not  mean  to  charge  our  Orthodox  friends  with  believing 
in  persecution.  We  only  show  that  if  Orthodoxy  is  in  the  letter,  they  ought, 
consequentially,  to  believe  in  persecution.  No  doubt  Protestantism  has  put 
an  end  to  persecution.  "When  Luther  came,  all  believed  in  persecution  ;  now, 
ao  one  does.  This  is  because  the  Reformation  contained  a  double  princi- 
ple :  first,  that  we  are  saved  by  faith,  not  by  sacraments,  and  that  faith  is  the 
belief  of  doctrines;  second,  that  to  see  them  aright,  we  must  use  our  own 
minds,  and  consequently  seek  for  truth  as  the  paramount  duty  of  life.  But  in 
order  to  seek  effectually,  we  must  seek  freely  —  hence  the  right  of  private  judg- 
ment as  against  authority  in  Church  and  State.  The  last  principle  is  that  of 
toleration ;  the  first  is  the  principle  of  intolerance.  The  last  has  proved  the 
stronger,  because  it  rests  on  the  logic  of  things,  the  other  only  on  the  logic  of 
words 


22      ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

forget  that  which  is  behind  in  order  to  press  forward  to  that 
which  is  before.  The  doctrines  of  Orthodoxy  therefore, 
when  once  established,  should  afterwards  be  assumed,  and 
need  not  be  proved.  We  do  not  call  a  scientific  man  a  bigot 
because  he  refuses  to  discuss  fundamental  principles.  If 
Orthodoxy  be  science,  why  accuse  it  of  bigotry  when  it  fol- 
lows the  same  course? 

§  5.  The  Doctrine  of  Essentials  and  Non-essentials  leads 
to  Borne. — If  Orthodoxy  consists  in  a  statement  of  opinions 
the  belief  of  which  is  essential  to  salvation,  the  question 
arises,  Are  all  these  opinions  essential,  or  only  a  part  ?  It  is 
generally  admitted  that  the  great  system  called  Orthodoxy 
contains  some  things  not  essential  to  salvation.  How  shall 
these  be  distinguished?  Moreover,  some  variation  of  state- 
ment is  judged  allowable.  No  Orthodox  creed  is  assumed 
to  be  inspired  as  to  its  language.  The  same  essential  truth 
may  be  expressed  in  different  terms.  How,  then,  are  we  to 
define  the  limits  of  expression  so  as  to  know  what  error  of 
opinion  is  venial,  and  what  vital?  Orthodoxy  assures  us 
that  our  salvation  depends  on  accepting  its  statements.  In 
which  particular  form,  then,  must  we  accept  them?  In  so 
important  a  matter  as  this,  where  salvation  is  assumed  to 
depend  on  accepting  the  right  form  of  doctrine,  one  surely 
ought  to  be  able  to  know  which  the  right  form  is.  Now, 
the  rule  of  Orthodoxy,  as  given  above,  is,  that  nothing  is 
Orthodox,  as  essential  doctrine,  which  has  not  been  believed 
"  always,  everywhere,  and  by  all."  But  this  raises  an  his- 
torical question,  and  one  of  no  little  difficulty.  For  since 
heresies  have  always  existed,  and  some  one  has  always  been 
found  somewhere  to  deny  the  most  essential  doctrines  of  Or- 
thodoxy, the  question  is  somewhat  intricate  who  these  "  all" 
are  who  have  never  disbelieved  the  Orthodox  system.  It  is 
plain  that  the  majority  of  Christians  have  neither  time  nor 
ability  for  these  investigations.  The  historical  inquiry  must 
be  conducted  for  them  by  others.     And  here  seems  to  come 


THE   PRINCIPLE   OF    ORTHODOXY   EXAMINED.  23 

iu  the  law  of  Church  authority  as  against  private  judg- 
ment. And  so  the  principle  of  Orthodoxy,  carried  out  to  its 
legitimate  results,  appears  to  land  us  at  last  in  the  Roman 
Catholic  Church,  to  set  aside  the  right  of  private  judgment, 
and  to  justify  intolerance  and  the  forcible  suppression  of 
heresy.  But  as  these  results  are  not  accepted  by  those  who 
yet  accept  the  principles  of  Orthodoxy,  it  is  necessary  to  see 
if  there  is  a  fallacy  anywhere  in  our  course  of  thought,  and 
at  what  precise  point  the  fallacy  has  come  in. 

§  6.  Fallacy  in  this  Orthodox  Argument.  —  The  fallacy  in 
all  this  argument  lies  here  —  that  faith  is  confounded  with 
belief;  knowledge  with  opinion  ;  the  sight  of  truth  with  its 
intellectual  statement  in  the  form  of  doctrine.  Undoubt- 
edly there  is  only  one  faith,  but  there  may  be  many  ways  of 
stating  it  in  the  form  of  opinion.  Moreover,  no  man,  no 
church,  no  age,  sees  the  whole  of  truth.  Truth  is  multi- 
lateral, but  men's  minds  are  unilateral.  They  are  mirrors 
which  reflect,  and  that  imperfectly,  the  side  of  the  object 
which  is  towards  them.  Therefore  even  knowledge  in  any 
finite  mind  is  partial,  consequently  imperfect,  and  conse* 
quently  needs  other  knowledge  to  complete  it. 

This,  apparently,  is  what  the  apostle  Paul  means  (1  Cor. 
13  :  8-12)  in  his  statement  <;oncerning  the  relation  between 
knowledge  and  love.  Knowledge  (Gnosis)  "  shall  pass 
away."  The  word  here  used  is  elsewhere  ti*ansiated  by 
"  destroyed,"  "  brought  to  nought,"  "  abolished,"  "  made  of 
none  effect."  "  Knowledge"  here  probably  refers  to  definite 
and  systematic  statements  of  real  insights.  It  is  something 
more  than  opinion,  but  something  less  than  faith.  Faith 
abides,  but  knowledge  passes  away.  Faith  abides,  because 
it  is  a  positive  sight  of  truth.  It  is  an  experience  of  the 
soul,  by  which  it  opens  itself  in  trust,  and  becomes  receptive 
of  spiritual  influence.  Faith,  therefore,  remains,  and  its 
results  are  permanent  in  the  soul.  They  make  the  substance 
•f  our  knowledge  as  regards  the  spiritual  world.     This  sub- 


24  ORTHODOXY  :    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

stance  becomes  a  part  of  the  soul  itself,  and  constitutes  a 
basis  of  self-consciousness  as  real  as  is  its  experience  of  the 
external  world.  But  Gnosis  is  this  faith,  translated  by  the 
intellect  into  systematic  form.  Such  systems  embody  real 
experience,  and  are  necessary  for  mental  and  moral  progress. 
They  are  the  bodies  of  thought.  But  all  bodies  must  die, 
sooner  or  later ;  and  so  all  systems  of  knowledge  must  pass 
away.  The  body,  at  first,  helps  the  growth  of  thought,  helps 
the  growth  of  the  soul ;  but  afterwards  it  hinders  it.  The 
new  wine  must  be  put  into  new  bottles.  Therefore  the 
apostle  Paul,  the  great  teacher  of  doctrinal  theology  in  the 
Christian  Church,  distinctly  recognizes  here,  that  every  sys- 
tem of  doctrine,  no  matter  how  much  truth  it  contains,  is 
partial,  and  therefore  transient.  He  makes  no  exception  in 
favor  even  of  inspired  statements  —  he  does  not  except  his  own. 
All  bodies  must  die  ;  all  forms  are  fugitive  ;  nothing  continues 
but  the  substance  of  knowledge,  which  is  faith ;  the  inward 
sight  of  God's  goodness  producing  that  endless  expectation 
which  is  called  hope ;  and  the  large  spiritual  communion 
with  Grod  and  his  creatures,  here  called  Agape,  or  love. 
The  apostle  speaks  in  the  first  person  when  he  says  that  knowl- 
edge passes  away  —  "  We  know  in  part,  and  we  prophesy  [or 
teachj  in  part."    He  speaks  for  himself  and  his  fellow-apostles. 

We  see,  therefore,  that  the  great  master  and  head  of 
Orthodoxy  in  the  Church  has  himself  declared  every  form 
of  Orthodoxy  to  be  transient. 

We  conclude,  therefore,  that  the  apostle  Paul,  in  this 
famous  passage,  overturns  the  whole  principle  of  verbal 
Orthodoxy.  He  takes  away  its  foundation.  Not  denying 
the  reality  and  permanence  of  religious  experience,  not  deny- 
ing the  saving  power  of  truth,  he  declares  that  no  expressed 
system  of  truth  is  permanent.  The  basis  of  doctrinal  Or- 
thodoxy is  the  assumption  that  its  own  particular  form  of 
belief  is  essential  to  salvation.  But  the  apostle  declares  that 
all  forms  are  transient,  and,  therefore,  none  essential.     All 


THE   PRINCIPLE   OF   ORTHODOXY   EXAMINED.  25 

Statement  is  a  limitation,  and  the  moment  that  wo  make  a 
definition,  we  say  something  which  is  incomplete.  When 
Paul  says,  "  We  know  in  part,"  he  says  the  same  thing  which 
is  said  by  Kant,  by  Sir  William  Hamilton,  by  Augusta 
Comte,  by  Mr.  Mansell,  and  most  modern  thinkers,  when 
they  declare  the  relativity  of  knowledge.  All  thinking  is 
limitation.  "  To  think,"  says  Sir  William  Hamilton,  "  is  to 
condition."  We  only  know  a  thing,  says  this  school,  by  its 
being  different  from  something  else.  The  school  of  Kant 
declares  all  knowledge  to  be  phenomenal,  and  that  all  phe- 
nomenal knowledge  consists  of  two  parts  —  the  part  given 
by  the  thing,  and  the  part  added  by  the  mind.  Herbert 
Spencer  (in  "First  Principles")  insists  on  the  certainty  of 
the  existence  of  things  in  themselves,  but  also  on  their 
absolute  and  eternal  unknowableness.  Accoi-ding  to  John 
Stuart  Mill,  the  same  view  of  the  unknowableness  of  Nou- 
mena  is  taken  by  M.  Auguste  Comte. 

These  modern  philosophers,  it  will  be  seen,  go  much  far- 
ther than  Paul,  and  lay  down  positions  which  inaugurate  a 
universal  scepticism.  According  to  them  there  is  nothing 
certain  and  nothing  fixed.  Mr.  Mansell  virtually  teaches  us 
that  we  cannot  know  anything  of  God,  duty,  or  immortality  ; 
and  that  faith  means,  taking  for  granted  on  some  outward 
authority.  To  use  a  striking  expression  of  President  James 
Walker,  "  We  are  not  to  believe,  but  to  make  believe." 
That  is,  we  are  not  to  believe  with  our  intellect,  but  with  our 
will.  Or,  in  other  words,  we  are  to  believe  not  what  is  true, 
but  what  is  expedient.  This  he  calls  regulative  truth,  as 
opposed  to  speculative  truth. 

But  this  is  by  no  means  the  doctrine  of  the  apostle  Paul. 
He  teaches  the  certainty  of  substantive  knowledge,  but  the 
fallibility  of  formal  knowledge.  He  thus  avoids  the  two  ex- 
tremes of  dogmatism  on  the  one  side,  and  scepticism  on  the 
other.  The  substance  of  Gnosis,  which  is  the  sight  of  truth, 
is  a  reality,  and,  like  all  that  is  real,  has  its  root  in  God,  and 
3 


26      ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

shares  his  eternity.  The  form  of  Gnosis  is  subjective, 
relative,  and  transient.  Everything  which  is  seen  is  tem- 
poral ;  only  that  which  is  not  seen  is  eternal.  All  that  takes 
outward,  visible  form,  comes  under  the  law  of  change ;  the 
roots  of  our  knowledge,  fixed  in  God,  are  unchangeable. 

§  7.  The  three  Tendencies  in  the  Church.  —  The  human 
soul,  a  unit,  indivisible,  and  without  parts,  nevertheless  acts 
in  three  directions  —  of  will,  affection,  intellect.  These  are 
distinguishable,  though  not  divisible.  Every  one  knows  the 
difference  between  smact;  an  emotion  of  anger,  pity,  sorrow, 
love;  and  a  process  of  logic,  or  an  intellectual  argument. 
These  are  the  three  primary  states  of  the  mind,  evidently 
distinct.  It  is  impossible  to  mistake  either  for  the  other.  I 
may  direct  my  mind  towards  action,  towards  thought,  or  to- 
wards emotion.  The  first  of  these,  action,  is  the  most  within 
my  own  power,  depends  chiefly  on  myself,  lies  nearest  the 
will.  Will  passes  instantaneously  into  action.  I  will  to  lift 
my  arm,  and  it  is  done.  On  the  other  hand,  feeling  or  emo- 
tion lies  the  farthest  from  this  centre  of  will,  depends  least 
of  all  on  my  own  choice,  and  in  it  I  am  most  passive.  But 
the  sphere  of  intellect  is  intermediate.  I  am  more  free  when 
I  think  than  when  I  feel ;  less  free  than  when  I  act.  In  the 
domain  of  will,  I  act  upon  external  things ;  in  the  domain 
of  feeling,  I  am  acted  upon  by  external  things ;  in  the  do- 
main of  intellect,  I  neither  act  nor  am  acted  upon,  but  I  see 
them.  In  all  thinking,  in  proportion  as  it  is  pure  thought, 
both  will  and  emotion  are  excluded.  We  are  neither  actors 
nor  sufferers,  but  spectators.  Things  seen  pass  into  our  life 
through  the  intellect,  and  become  sources  of  emotion  and 
action.  Love  of  truth  causes  us  to  desire  to  know  it ;  this 
desire  leads  us  to  put  our  mind  in  the  presence  of  truth,  but 
when  there,  the  functions  of  emotion  and  will  cease,  and  all 
we  have  to  do  is  to  look. 

Now,  there  have  always  been  in  the  Church  three  parties, 
or  at  least  three  tendencies,  in  regard  to  the  basis  of  religion. 


THE   PRINCIPLE    OP   ORTHODOXY    EXAMINED.  27 

One  of  these  makes  the  basis  of  the  religious  life  to  consist 
in  thought,  one  posits  it  iu  feeling,  the  third  in  action.  With 
one,  the  intellect  must  take  the  initiative ;  with  the  second, 
the  heart ;  with  the  third,  the  will,  or  power  of  determina- 
tion. The  three  parties  in  the  Church,  based  on  these  three 
tendencies,  may  be  characterized  as  the  Orthodoxists,  the 
Emotionalists,  and  the  party  of  "Works.  The  first  says, 
"  "We  are  saved  by  faith  ;  "  the  second  says,  "  "We  are  saved 
by  love  ; "  the  third  says,  "  We  are  saved  by  obedience." 
The  first  assumes  that  the  sight  of  truth  must  take  the  lead 
in  all  Christian  expei-ience ;  the  second  believes  that  love  for 
goodness  is  the  true  basis  in  religion  ;  the  third  maintains 
that  the  first  thing  to  be  done,  in  order  to  become  a  religious 
man,  is  to  obey  the  law  of  duty.  It  is  evidently  very  impor- 
tant to  decide  which  of  these  answers  is  the  true  one.  What 
are  we  to  do  first,  if  Ave  wish  to  become  Christian  men  or 
women  ?  Are  Ave  to  study,  read,  reflect,  in  order  to  know 
the  truth  ?  Are  we  to  go  to  church  and  listen  to  sermons, 
join  Bible  classes  and  study  the  Scriptures,  read  com- 
pends  of  doctrine  and  books  of  Christian  evidence?  Or 
are  we  to  seek  for  emotion,  to  pray  for  a  change  of  heart,  to 
put  ourselves  under  exciting  influences,  to  go  Avhere  a  revi- 
val is  in  progress,  to  attend  protracted  meetings,  to  be  influ- 
enced through  sympathy  till  Ave  are  filled  full  of  emotions  of 
anxiety,  fear,  remorse,  folloAved  by  emotions  of  hope,  trust, 
gratitude,  pardon,  peace,  joy?  Or  are  we  to  do  neither  of 
these  things,  but  to  begin  by  obedience,  trying  to  do  right 
in  order  to  he  right,  beginning  by  the  performance  of  the 
humblest  duties,  the  nearest  duties,  letting  fidelity  in  the  least 
open  the  Avay  to  more?  Shall  we  know  the  truth  in  order  to 
love  it  and  do  it?  Or  shall  we  love  the  truth  in  order  to  see 
it  and  do  it?  Or  shall  Ave  do  right  in  order  to  knoAV  it  and 
love  it? 

Large  numbers  in  the  Church  have  followed  each  of  these 
three  methods,  and  made  each  the  basis  of  its  action.     One 


28     orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

has  said,  "  We  are  saved  by  works  ; "  a  second,  "  We  are 
saved  by  faith  ;  "  a  third,  "  We  are  saved  by  love." 

§  8.    The  Party  of  Worhs.  —  Two  tendencies  have  joined 
in  teaching  salvation  by  works,  or,  more  strictly,  in  teaching 
the  initiative  of  the  will  in  religion.     These  are  the  Church- 
tendency   and    the    Moral-tendency   in    Christianity.      The 
Church  party  in  Christianity  teaches  that  the  first  duty  to- 
wards a  child  is  to  make  it  a  member  of  the  Christian  Church 
by  baptism,  and  that  the  first  duty  of  ^very  baptized  person  » 
is  to  obey  the  commands  of  the  Church.     The  Church  thus 
becomes  a  school,  in  which  baptized  persons  are  educated  as 
Christians.     The  Church  of  Rome,   and  the  High  Church 
party  in  the  Church  of  England  and  in  the  Episcopal  Church 
of  the  United   States,  teach  this  doctrine  of  salvation  by 
works.     This  system  by  no  means  dispenses  with  Christian 
belief  or  Christian  feeling,  but  makes  them  both  subordinate. 
The  Church  says  to  its  faithful.  We  do  not  require  you  to 
believe  or  to  feel,  but  to  obey.     If  we  said,  "  Believe,"  or 
"Feel,"  you    might  justly   reply,   "We  cannot  believe   or 
feel  when  we  choose,  and  you  have  therefore  no  right  to  ask 
us  to  do  so."     Therefore  the  Church  only  demands  obedi- 
ence, which  it  is  in  the  power  of  all  to  render.     It,  indeed, 
requires  an  assent  to  its  creed,  and  forbids  heresy.     But  this 
only  means,  "  Receive  the  creed  as  true  until  you  are  able  to 
see  how  it  is  true."     The  Church  also  insists  greatly  on  love, 
and  its  saints  have  been  filled  with  the  highest  raptures  of 
piety.     But  it  never  requires   feeling.     It   says,  "  Use  the 
means  we  put  into  your  hands,  and  feeling  will  come.    Pray, 
as  we  command  you  to  do,  whether  you  feel  deeply  or  not. 
Feeling  will  come  by  and  by."     Discipline,  therefore,  and 
not  illumination,  has  been  the  method  of  the  Church  of 
Rome,  and  is  also  the  method  of  all  other  Churches,  so  far 
as   they   are   ecclesiastical  Churches.      All  such  Churches 
teach  that  by  a  faithful  conformity  to  their  ritual,  methods, 
Bacraments,  services,  discipline,  the  Christian  life  will  surely 


THE    PRINCIPLE   OP   ORTHODOXY    EXAMINED.  29 

come.  The  one  thing  needful  and  primary  with  them  all 
is  obedience,  and  the  result  of  obedience  is  knowledge  and 
love. 

Essentially  the  same  view  is  taken  by  the  Ethical  party, 
or  Moralists,  in  Christianity.  Their  statement,  also,  of  the 
foundation  of  religion  is,  that  it  lies  in  obedience.  They  dif- 
fer only  from  the  Church  party  as  regards  the  authority  to 
be  obeyed.  "With  them  it  is  not  the  Church,  but  the  Moral 
,  Law,  as  made  known  to  men  in  revelation,  or  in  the  natural 
instincts  of  conscience.  The  foundation  of  all  goodness  and 
religion  is  right  doing.  This  leads  to  right  thinking  and 
right  feeling ;  or,  when  it  does  not  lead  to  these,  it  is  still 
sufficient,  and  is  satisfactory  to  God.  "  What  doth  the  Lord 
require  of  thee,"  say  they,  "  but  to  do  justly,  and  love  mercy, 
and  walk  humbly  with  thy  God?"  At  this  point  the  ex- 
tremes meet,  and  the  Roman  Catholic  Church,  or  the  extreme 
right,  offers  its  hand  to  the  Liberal  Christians,  or  the  extreme 
left.  This  is  the  point  of  contact  between  the  two,  which 
sometimes,  also,  becomes  a  bridge  by  which  proselytes  pass 
either  way,  from  one  to  the  other.  But  the  practical  ques- 
tion is.  Is  this  answer  sound  ?  Does  the  will  lead  the  way 
in  religion  ?  Is  obedience  the  first  step  to  be  taken  at  every 
point  of  the  way  ?  Is  the  initiative  in  the  religious  life  al- 
ways an  action  ?     Are  we  saved  by  works  ? 

The  objection  to  this  view  is,  that  a  religious  action,  with- 
out a  religious  thought  and  a  religious  affection  behind  it,  is 
not  in  any  sense  religious.  It  has  in  it  nothing  of  the  essence 
of  religion.  Religion,  regarded  merely  as  obedience  to  God, 
implies  the  knowledge  of  God.  We  must  know  God  in  orde.- 
to  obey  him ;  Ave  must  know  God  in  order  to  love  him. 
Knowledge,  therefore,  must  precede  obedience,  and  not  the 
contrary.  Otherwise  obedience  is  an  empty  form,  having 
no  religious  character.  Unless  we  see  the  truth  and  justice 
of  obedience,  we  are  only  yielding  to  human  persuasion,  to 
human  authority,  and  not  to  the  authority  of  God.  It  may 
3* 


30      ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

be  well,  or  it  may  be  ill,  to  yield  to  such  human  authority ; 
but  there  is  no  religion  in  it,  or  only  a  religion  of  dead 
works. 

§  9.  The  Party  of  Emotion  in  Christianity.  —  There  are 
those,  and  always  have  been  those,  who  have  placed  the  sub- 
stance of  religion  in  love,  in  which  they  have,  perhaps,  not 
bean  mistaken.  But  they  have  often  taken  another  step,  by 
degrading  love  into  mere  emotion.  They  have  considered  that 
feeling  was  the  basis  of  religion ;  not  thought,  nor  action. 
They  too  have  texts  to  quote  in  support  of  their  view.  They 
say  that  "  with  the  heart  meu  believe  unto  righteousness  ;  " 
that  we  must  "  be  rooted  and  grounded  in  love ;  "  that  the 
first  commandment  is  to  "  love  God  with  all  the  heart."  As 
with  them  religious  emotion  constitutes  the  essence  of  reli- 
gion, they  make  use  of  all  means  of  producing  it,  and  es- 
pecially the  excitement  which  comes  from  sympathy.  The 
Methodist  Church  has,  perhaps,  gone  farther  than  any  other 
towards  making  this  a  principle.  This  great  and  noble  body 
has  done  its  vast  work  for  Christianity  by  making  prominent 
the  love-principle  in  all  its  operations.  If  the  Church  party 
stands  at  one  extreme,  Methodism,  in  all  its  forms,  stands  at 
the  other.  The  Roman  Catholic  Church  sums  up  all  the  in- 
spirations of  the  past,  collects  in  its  large  repertoire  all  ancient 
■liturgies,  all  saintly  lives,  all  sacred  customs,  and  so  brings 
an  imposing  authority,  a  reverend  antiquity,  made  up  of  the 
best  history  of  man.  Methodism  drops  the  past,  and  finds 
God  in  the  present  —  in  present  inspirations,  in  the  newly- 
converted  soul,  born  out  of  darkness  into  light,  by  the  imme- 
diate coming  of  the  Spirit  of  God.  According  to  the  Catho- 
lic Church  the  Christian  life  commences  with  an  outward  act, 
—that  of  baptism,  —  and  is  carried  on  by  outward  sacraments  ; 
according  to  Methodism,  the  Christian  life  begins  with  an 
inward  emotional  experience,  —  the  spiritual  new  birth,  —  and 
is  carried  on  by  successive  emotions  of  penitence,  faith,  hope, 
joy,  and  pious  devotion.     According  to  Catholicism,  the  one 


THE   PRINCIPLE   OP   ORTHODOXY   EXAMINED.  31 

thing  needful  is  the  outward  sacramental  union  with  the 
Church  ;  according  to  Methodism,  the  one  thing  needful  is 
the  inward  emotional  union  with  the  Holy  Spirit. 

§  10.  The  Faith  Party  in  Religion.— li  Churchism  and  Mor- 
alism  place  the  essence  of  Christianity  in  action,  and  Emo- 
tionalism puts  it  in  feeling.  Orthodoxy  places  it  in  some- 
thing intellectual,  which  it  calls  faith.  All  the  sects  of  Christen- 
dom do,  indeed,  place  faith  at  the  root  of  the  Christian  life  ; 
but  some  make  it  essentially  an  intellectual  act,  others  essen- 
tially affectionate,  and  others  an  act  of  will.  Orthodoxy 
makes  it,  in  substance,  a  sight  of  faith,  or  an  act  of  looking 
at  spiritual  realities.  Sometimes  it  is  called  a  realizing 
sense  of  spiritual  things.  But,  at  all  events,  the  sight  of 
truth  is  considered  the  beginning  and  root  of  religion  by  the 
Orthodox  party  in  the  Church.  We  are  saved  by  the  Avord 
of  truth ;  and  the  Saviour  himself  is  called  "  the  Word," 
—  belief  in  whom  constitutes  eternal  life.  Rationally,  it  is 
argued  that  the  essential  difference  between  the  Christian 
and  the  unbeliever,  or  the  unchristian,  must  lie  in  seeing 
Christ  or  not  seeing  him.  The  first  step  in  the  religious 
life  always  consists  in  looking  at  the  truth. 

§  11.  Truth  in  the  Orthodox  Idea.  —  Admitting,  then, 
what  all  these  systems  and  parties  in  the  Church  unite  in 
asserting,  —  that  an  act  of  faith  is  always  at  the  foundation 
of  every  Christian  state  and  of  all  Christian  experience,  — 
we  ask,  Which  is  the  most  essential  element  in  faith  —  will, 
intellect,  or  affection  ?  Is  an  act  of  faith  chiefly  an  act  of  the 
will,  a  determination,  or  is  it  a  loving  desire,  or  a  state  of 
knowledge,  a  looking  at  truth  ?  Suppose  we  call  it  a  state  of 
love,  for  this  reason,  that  in  order  to  be  good,  the  first  thing 
requisite  is  to  wish  to  be  good.  A  longing  for  goodness,  it 
may  be  said,  must  precede  everything  else.  But  what  makes 
us  long  for  goodness,  if  we  do  desii-e  it?  What  shall  produce 
that  longing,  if  it  does  not  exist?  The  only  answer  must 
be,  The  sight  of  truth.     The  sight  of  God's  holiness  and  of 


32      ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

God's  tenderness,  the  sight  of  law  and  gospel,  whatever 
shows  us  the  beauty  of  goodness  and  the  meanness  of  sin, 
must  come  first  to  awaken  this  desire.  Or  suppose  it  be 
said  that  the  essential  thing  in  faith  is  the  active  element, 
because  it  is  submitting  to  God's  law,  trusting  in  his  help, 
coming  to  the  truth,  opening  the  heart  to  the  Holy  Spirit, — 
all  of  which  are  determinations  of  the  will.  We  must  reply. 
True  ;  but  these  determinations  will  never  be  taken  unless 
we  first  see  the  will  of  God  to  which  we  submit,  see  the  sal- 
vation of  God  on  which  we  lean,  know  that  there  is  a  truth 
to  which  we  may  come,  know  that  there  is  a  Holy  Spirit,  in 
order  to  ask  for  it. 

So  that,  on  the  whole,  we  may  say  that  Orthodoxy  is  right 
in  making  the  sight  of  truth  the  beginning  of  the  Christian 
life,  and  the  beginning  of  every  Christian  state,  act,  or  ex- 
perience. All  human  goodness  is  the  reflection  of  God's 
goodness ;  it  all  has  its  source  in  the  sight  of  a  divine  holi- 
ness, truth,  beauty.  This  is  the  fundamental  idea  of  Ortho- 
doxy, and  in  this  Orthodoxy  is  right. 

It  is  no  answer  to  this  to  say  that  man  has  an  instinctive 
longing  for  goodness,  which  causes  him  to  feel  after  God  be- 
fore he  finds  him.  For  what  are  these  instincts  themselves,  as 
soon  as  they  begin  to  act,  but  the  voice  of  God  speaking  in  the 
soul,  showing  it  some  glimpses  of  a  divine  truth?  The  long- 
ing in  the  soul  must  be  aroused  by  the  sight  or  knowledge 
of  something  better  than  that  which  one  has  or  is.  Conse- 
quently, we  say  again,  that  the  sight  of  truth  is  that  which 
saves  the  soul,  and  first  creates  in  it  a  better  life. 

If  we  make  Christianity  to  be  essentially  obedience,  we 
make  of  it,  at  last,  an  oppressive  form.  If  we  consider  it 
as  essentially  an  emotional  experience,  we  destroy  its  moral 
character ;  for  emotion  is  both  passive  and  blind,  while  the 
definition  of  morality  is  the  freely  choosing  what  we  see  to 
be  right.  Ecclesiasticism  and  Emotionalism  both  tend  to  de- 
moralize Christianity.     They  remove  from  it  the  element  of 


THE   PRINCIPLE   OP   ORTHODOXY   EXAMINED.  33 

moral  freedom  in  the  interest  either  of  Church  authority  or 
of  mystical  piety.  Then  Christianity  must  come  anew,  in 
the  form  of  truth,  to  purify  the  air,  and  renew  the  moral 
life  of  society. 

Protestantism  arose  in  this  way,  to  salt  the  corrupting 
Church.  Ecclesiasticism,  in  its  well-meant  efforts  at  training 
men,  by  a  complete  discipline,  to  a  perfect  virtue,  had  sup- 
pressed the  individual  love  of  truth  to  such  an  extent,  that 
religion  had  become  a  mere  surface,  without  substance. 
Jesuitism  abolished  the  distinction  between  things  right 
and  wrong  in  themselves,  and  made  right  to  consist  solely  in 
the  intention  ;  that  is,  made  it  wholly  subjective.  The  JjU- 
theran  reformation  was  the  revival  of  the  intellect  in  regard 
to  religion  —  the  demand  for  conviction  instead  of  assent ; 
for  the  sight  of  God  in  place  of  obedience  to  the  Church. 
It  repeated,  with  an  emphasis  adapted  to  the  needs  of  the 
sixteenth  century,  the  words  of  Jesus,  "  This  is  life  eternal, 
to  hnoio  thee,  the  only  true  God,  and  Jesus  Christ  whom 
thou  hast  sent."  In  these  words  is  the  sufficient  defence  of 
Protestantism.  It  was  the  cry  of  the  soul  to  know  God,  and 
not  merely  to  assent  to  what  the  Church  taught  concerning 
him ;  it  was  the  longing  to  knoio  Christ,  and  not  to  repeat  by 
rote  the  creeds  of  the  first  centuries,  and  the  definitions  of 
mediaeval  doctors  in  regard  to  him.  In  a  subsequent  chap- 
ter we.  shall  consider  the  truth  and  error  in  the.  Protestant 
principle  of  justification  by  faith.  Our  purpose  here  is  to 
show  that  the  truth  in  Orthodoxy  is  identical  with  the  truth 
in  Protestantism.  Both  place,  as  the  root  of  all  religion,  an 
individual  personal  sight  of  God  and  truth.  To  this,  free- 
dom of  thought  is  an  essential  means.  Right  thinking  in- 
volves free  thinking.  If  to  know  the  truth  makes  us  free, 
freedom,  again,  is  the  condition  of  knowing  the  truth.  Prot- 
estantism and  Orthodoxy  have  often  attempted  to  limit  the 
application  of  this  principle.  Protestants,  as  well  as  Catho- 
lics, have  persecuted  heretics.    But  while  Catholics,  in  doing 


34  orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

this,  have  been  faithful  to  their  own  idea,  and  have  therefore 
made  of  persecution  a  system,  Protestants  have  been  vacil- 
lating and  undecided  persecutors.  They  have  been  drawn 
in  opposite  directions  by  antagonist  principles.  Fundamen- 
tally, Protestantism,  as  such,  claims  for  all  the  rights  of  pri- 
vate judgment,  and  is,  therefore,  in  its  whole  stress  and 
influence,  opposed  to  persecution,  and  in  favor  of  religious 
liberty.  It  has  conquered  the  Catholic  Church  on  this  point 
so  far  as  to  compel  it  to  renounce  the  practice  of  persecu- 
tion, if  it  has  not  relinquished  the  theory.  .  During  three 
centuries  Protestantism  has  been,  more  and  more,  emanci- 
pating the  human  mind  —  making  it  the  duty,  and  conse- 
quently the  right,  of  every  human  being  to  see  truth  for  him- 
self. It  has  been  drawn  into  inconsistencies  by  its  belief  in 
the  saving  power  of  certain  doctrines,  and  the  supreme  im- 
portance of  believing  them.  On  one  hand  it  has  claimed, 
with  a  trumpet  voice,  the  freedom  of  conscience  and  opinion 
for  all,  and  then  has  cried  out  against  those  who  freely 
came  to  opinions  diifering  from  its  own. 

But,  notwithstanding  these  inconsistencies.  Protestantism 
has  steadily  given  freedom  of  spirit  to  mankind.  And  with 
the  awakened  and  emancipated  intellect  all  the  elements  of 
progress  have  shown  themselves  in  Protestant  lauds.  In 
1517,  when  Luther  nailed  his  theses  to  the  church  door, 
Italy,  Spain,  and  Portugal  were  far  in  advance  of  Northern 
Europe  in  civilization.  In  commerce,  art,  and  literature, 
Italy  was  the  queen  of  Europe.  In  military  force,  extent 
of  possessions,  and  unbounded  wealth,  Spain  Avas  the  lead- 
ing power  of  the  world.  The  Portuguese  mariners  had 
ransacked  every  sea,  and  discovered  new  continents  and 
islands  in  every  zone.  How  insignificant,  in  comparison 
with  these  great  nations,  were  England,  Holland,  and  Ger- 
many !  But  England,  Holland,  and  Germany  became  Prot- 
estant ;  Italy,  Spain,  and  Portugal  remained  Catholic  ; 
while  France  and  Austria  adopted  a  half-way  Catholicism. 


THE   PRINCIPLE   OF    ORTHODOXY    EXAMINED.  85 

The  result  has  been,  in  the  course  of  three  centuries,  a  com- 
plete reversal  of  the  position.  The  last  have  become  first, 
and  the  first  last.  What  now  has  become  of  the  terrible 
power  of  Spain,  the  enterprise  of  Portugal,  the  art  and 
literature  of  Italy?  When  the  element  of  Protestantism 
was  crushed  out  of  these  nations  by  the  Inquisition,  the 
principle  of  national  progress  was  also  destroyed.  But  the 
northern  powers  who  accepted  the  Lutheran  reform  re- 
ceived with  it  the  germs  of  progress.  Holland,  Denmark, 
Norway,  Sweden,  Prussia,  Saxony,  England,  and  Scotland, 
have,  by  a  steady  progress  in  civilization,  Avealth,  knowl- 
edge, and  morality,  conclusively  demonstrated  the  impulse 
of  progress  contained  in  the  Protestant  idea. 

So  far,  therefore,  as  this  great  experiment,  continued 
during  three  hundred  years,  can  prove  anything,  it  proves 
the  truth  of  the  central  idea  of  Protestantism  and  Ortho- 
doxy, namely,  that  saving  faith  is  essentially  not  emotional 
nor  volitional,  but  intellectual. 

§  12.  Error  in  the  Orthodox  Principle.  —  We  are  well 
aware  of  the  reply  which  might  be  made,  from  the  stand- 
point of  Ecclesiasticism,  to  the  historical  argument  just 
given.  The  Roman  Catholic  might  answer  thus :  "  We 
admit  that  the  tree  must  be  known  by  its  fruits ;  but  the 
tree  of  true  Christianity  is  known  by  bearing  the  fruits  of 
Christianity,  not  those  of  worldly  civilization.  Suppose  that 
England  is  to-day  richer  than  Italy,  more  powerful  than 
Spain  ;  is  she  better?  Are  there  more  piety  and  more  morality 
in  Protestant  than  in  Catholic  countries  ?  In  which  communi- 
ties do  you  find  the  most  humility,  simplicity,  religious  faith,* 
reverence  for  religious  institutions,  fear  of  God?  In  which 
do  you  find  most  of  sympathy,  kindliness,  good  will  from 
man  to  man?  The  fierce  civilization  of  Protestantism  is 
hard,  cold,  and  cruel.  It  tramples  under  its  feet  the  weak. 
It  accumulates  wealth  and  power  ;  but  are  these  Christianity  ? 
Is  London  or  Rome  the  best  model  of  a  Christian  city  ?     Is 


36  oeiHODOXT:  m  cbcths  x!a>  ebbmb. 

it  London,  widi  its  terriUe  eontnwta  of  enonnoos  wealA 
and  naked  want,  its  prood  ariatooaej  and  tratalized  mob, 
^  eaaaptj  'dmrebe^  and  iBmniaated  gin-siiofs?  or  ia  it  not 
ladier  'Borne,  yoonar  in  matenal  wealth  and  Inxnrj,  tnit  zidi 
in  grace  —  Botne,  with  its  odor  of  gacatdtj  aboat  it;  ite 
nauMTona  dinrdies,  on  wfaidli  art  baa  kmdied  ber  reaoorees 
to  make  them  wortfaj  to  be  the  taafHea  oi  God — Some, 
with  its  priests  and  monks ;  its  reUgioiis  booses^  the  eeotres 
0^  the  great  reiigioas  otd»3,  whose  nriwinng  bare  beoi 
known  in  the  fonr  quarters  ci  the  escrih?  Protestant  eaaa- 
tries  maj^  bare  a  bibber  worldly^  exvUizaSaoa,  more  edncation 
and  intdbgmee,  more  mami£fKtiiies  and  eommaee;  bat 
Catfaolie  eoontries  have  more  hmniKQr  and  reregeaee,  a 
more  habitual  inelj,  more  gmitle  mannas.  1£  ProCestaats 
hare  more  kwndedge,  Catbo^ies  bisre  more  hmcm" 

And  we,  thoo^  IVotestants  of  the  Ptroteatanfs,  most 
admit  that  there  is  some  tmdi  in  this.  The  daaapSne  of 
Bomanism  has  repressed  some  amoant  of  evil  nhieh  the 
ISbertj  of  Protestant  lands  has  allowed  to  appear.  Bat 
repressed  evil  is  none  die  less  evil,  and  oftm  works  a  greater 
inward  eorroption  than  when  it  is  allowed  to  riiow  itadf  as 
it  is.  We  maj  also  admit  that  while  in  Protestantiam  there 
is  more  of  tsxtxh,  and  all  the  virtues  which  go  tboewith, — 
soch  as  bcnestj,  manliness,  sd^reepect,  eoDsdendonsoesB, — 
in  Catbc^  eoontries  there  is  more  of  lots,  and  all  die 
rirtnes  wiudi  HcSiow  it,  —  as  kindlj^,  genial  mannas,  rvaAj 
tjmpaaikj  with  sofl^na^,  a  ^rit  of  dqmdoiee  and  tniat. 
Still,  this  does  not  prove  that  thoe  is  more  real  Cbarutiaaatj 
among  Catholics ;  for  lore  which  does  not  grow  oat  of  the 
si^  <d  truth  is  not  gnmine  nor  beahbj.  Its  life  is  weak. 
Kotestant  Cfaristianitjr  is  an  immature  frnit,  hanh  beeaose 
not  quite  ripe.  CathoHe  Obristiani^  is  a  fruit  orer-fipe, 
and  so  rotten. 

Therrfbre  we  atill  eontend  diat  Proteatantsm  and  Ortho- 
dozy  are  ri^  in  making  the  free  and  independent  fl^  of 


THB  PRLSCLFLE   OF  OBTHODOXY   EXAMDiED.  37 

trnth  the  root  of  aU  relioioD.  Bat  the  mistake  of  Orthodoxy 
has  been  in  confounding  tmth  with  doctrine  —  the  sight  of  the 
thing  with  the  tlieofy  about  that  sight.  From  hence  come 
the  hardness  and  eddoess  of  Orthodoxy.  Pnre  thooght  is 
always  otrfd,  and  oogfat  to  be.  The  sight  of  spiritnal  things 
b  troth  and  lore  in  one :  bat  when  we  begin  to  reflect  on 
that  sight,  the  lore  drope  oat,  and  the  troth  becomes  cold. 

The  defect  of  the  Orthodox  principle,  therefore,  is  the 
confosioD  of  truth  with  beUefL  Oat  of  this  mistake  come 
dogmatism,  bigotry,  and  all  their  natural  consequences.  It 
is  thaefoie  wdO,  before  grang  £uther,  to  explain  more  fiillj 
dds  distinctioa  and  its  inqiortaiiee. 

§  13.  Fai&,  KmowUdge,  Bdi^,  Opinum,  —  Religion  ori- 
ginates at  erery  momeiit,  from  looking  at  truth.  Now, 
there  are  £oai  kinds  of  kx^dng;  faitk,  which  is  intuitiTe 
loaidng ;  imomUdge,  whidi  is  the  intmtkm  itself  looked  at  bj 
reflectioa,  and  so  bron^t  to  consdouaness ;  third,  hdi^^ 
whidi  arranges  the  prodocts  of  knowledge  in  systematic 
fcRm,  sad  makes  them  eoi^moiis  with  eadi  other;  and 
lastfyeomes  opimian,  winch  does  not  deal  at  all  with  things, 
but  only  with  thnwgiita  aboat  things.  By  £uth  we  see  God ; 
by  knowledge  we  become  eooscioos  that  we  see  God ;  by 
bdief  we  arrange  in  order  what  we  see  ;  and  by  opinioQ  we 
fieel  and  grope  among  our  thoughts,  seddng  what  we  may 
find  ci  las  wo^s  and  ways.  Every  act  of  £uth  brings  us 
into  the  presence  of  God  himseH^  and  makes  us  partakers 
of  the  divine  natnre.  Thus  £uth  is  strictly  and  literaDy  the 
snbetance  of  things  hoped  iat,  or  tiie  sobstance  of  hofie.* 
Snbetanee  here  has  its  etymcJogical  sense,  and  is  the  same 
word  in  Gre^  and  English,  meaning  baas,  Ibmidation,  sup- 
port, or  snbetmelion.  It  is  ibe  inward  e^erienee  by  whiefa 
we  come  in  eootact  with  inrisiUe  thji^s,  as  perception  is 
the  experience  by  whidi  we  come  in  contact  with  Tmbfe 


38      ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

These  steps  of  intellectual  activity  may  be  called  by  othei 
names  than  these.  What  we  (with  Jacobi)  call  faith,*  may 
be  denominated  "intuition"  (with  the  transcendentalists), 
reason  (with  Colei-idge),  God-consciousness  (with  Schleier- 
maeher),  or  anschauungs-vermogen  (with  Schelling  and 
others).  But,  by  whatever  name  we  call  this  power,  we 
say  there  is  a  power  in  man  by  which  he  can  see  spiritual 
facts,  as  with  his  earthly  senses  he  can  perceive  sensible  facts. 
If  he  has  no  such  power,  he  is  incapable  of  knowing  God, 
but  can  only  have  an  opinion  that  there  is  a  God.  But  if 
he  can  know  God,  this  knowledge  rests  on  something  back 
of  reasoning  or  reflection  ;  it  must  rest  on  an  intuition  or 
spiritual  perception.  And  this,  for  our  present  purpose,  we 
call  faith.  By  means  of  it  we  know  the  spiritual  world, 
just  as  we  know  the  material  world  through  sight,  touch,  and 
hearing.  The  senses  are  the  organs  by  which  we  perceive 
material  things ;  intuition,  or  faith,  the  organ  by  which  we 
perceive  spiritual  things.*  He  who  denies  the  existence  of 
such  a  power  in  man,  falls  necessarily  into  dogmatism  on 
the  one  hand,  or  rationalism  on  the  other.  But  as  these 
words  also  take  a  very  different  sense  on  different  lips,  we 
explain  ourselves  by  saying  that  he  puts  either  a  theory  or 
an  inference  in  the  place  of  God.  If  orthodox,  he  puts  a 
theory ;  if  sceptical,  an  inference.  Mr.  Mansell  does  the 
first,  Herbert  Spencer  the  other.  Neither  of  them  believes 
that  we  can  know  God's  existence.  So  dogmatism  and 
scepticism  join  hands.  All  the  consequences  described  in 
the  beginning  of  this  chapter  follow  as  a  matter  of  course 
when  an  opinion  or  theory  is  put  in  the  place  of  truth.    Then 

*  Jacobi  —  whose  words  have  been  said  to  let  the  thoughts  shine  through, 
as  wet  clotlies  around  the  limbs  allow  the  lorm  to  be  seen  —  says  that  all 
knowledge  begins  with  faith.  Faith  is,  accordiug  to  Jacobi,  (1)  a  Icnowledge 
proceeding  from  immediate  revelation ;  (2)  knowledge  which  does  not  need, 
and  cannot  have,  proofs ;  (3)  much  more  certain  knowledge  than  any  derived 
from  demonstration ;  (4)  a  perception  of  the  super-sensual  world ;  (5')  a  well- 
grounded  and  reliable  prepossession  in  favor  of  certain  truths ;  (6)  a  faith  which 
sees,  and  a  sight  which  believes;  (")  a  vision,  an  impenetrable  mystery,  a  per- 
ception of  the  thing  in  itself. 


THE   PRINCIPLE   OF   ORTHODOXY    EXAMINED.  39 

come  the  inflexible  narrowness  of  bigotry,  the  hot  zeal  of  the 
persecutor,  the  sectarian  strife  which  has  torn  the  Church 
in  twain.  The  remedy  and  prevention  for  these  are  to  recog- 
nize that  the  basis  of  religion  is  in  faith,  in  a  living  sight  of 
God,  the  soul,  duty,  immortality,  which  are  always  and  for- 
ever the  same. 

The  best  definitions  of  faith,  by  theologians  of  all  schools, 
include  the  notion  of  insight,  will,  and  affection.  It  is  an  act 
of  the  soul  by  which  it  looks  at  truth.  But  this  act  implies 
a  desire  to  see  and  know  the  truth.  Now,  such  an  act  as 
this  lies  at  the  root  of  all  our  knowledge,  both  of  the  mate- 
rial and  spiritual  world.  How  do  I  know  the  outward 
world?  The  passive  exercise  of  sensation  would  never 
give  such  knowledge.  The  sights  which  enter  the  passive 
eye,  the  sounds  which  fill  the  passive  ear,  the  feelings  which 
affect  the  passive  sense,  give  no  real  knowledge  of  outward 
things.  That  comes,  not  from  sensation  merely,  but  from 
sensation  changed  into  experience  by  a  voluntary  activity. 
"We  must  not  only  see,  but  look  ;  not  only  hear,  but  listen  ; 
not  only  feel,  but  touch,  in  order  to  know.  Life,  therefore, 
the  constant  synthesis  of  these  three  elements,  —  life  which, 
in  every  act,  at  once  thinks,  feels,  and  does,  —  alone  gives  us 
knowledge.  Divorce  thought  from  affection  and  will,  and  let 
it  act  by  itself,  and  it  does  not  give  knowledge ;  it  only  gives 
belief  or  opinion.  Knowledge  comes  only  from  experience 
—  and  experience  means  communion.  Communion  with 
Nature  by  thought,  desire,  and  action  gives  us  the  knowledge 
of  Nature  ;  communion  with  God  by  thought,  desire,  and 
act,  gives  us  the  knowledge  of  God.  The  organ  by  which 
we  commune  with  God  is  faith  ;  it  includes  the  desire  of 
knowing  God,  and  the  act  of  looking  to  him  in  order  to 
know  him. 

Knowledge  of  God,  of  immortality,  and  of  spiritual  things 
does  not  come  from  any  process  of  reasoning  on  the  one 
hand,  nor  from  any  single  intuition  of  reason.     Just  so  we 


40      ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

do  not  know  the  material  world  by  a  process  of  reasoning  on 
the  one  hand,  or  any  single  sensible  perception  on  the  other. 
All  knoivledge  comes  from  life;  or,  as  the  apostle  John 
expresses  it,  "  Life  is  the  light  of  man."  We  become 
acquainted  with  outward  nature  by  living  processes  —  by 
repeated  acts  of  sight,  hearing,  touch,  taste.  So  we  become 
acquainted  with  the  spiritual  world  by  repeated  spiritual  acts  ; 
by  repeated  processes  of  faith ;  by  continued  steps  of 
devotion,  submission,  obedience,  trust,  love,  prayer.  In  this 
"Way  we  come  to  know  God  just  as  certainly,  and  just  in  the 
same  way,  as  we  know  things  visible  or  things  audible. 

But  knowledge  is  not  belief.  Knowledge  is  the  rooted 
conviction  of  the  reality  of  certain  facts  or  persons,  derived 
from  communing  with  those  facts  or  persons.  Belief  is  the 
intellectual  assent  to  a  proposition  —  a  proposition  formed 
by  analytic  and  synthetic  methods.  We  analyze  our 
notion  concerning  any  subject,  and  then  arrange  the  results 
of  this  analysis  in  order,  and  deduce  from  them  a  propo- 
sition, a  law.  This  we  call  our  belief,  or  creed,  concerning 
it.  The  substance  of  this  belief  is  given  us  in  life ;  the 
form  of  it  comes  from  thinking  or  reasoning.  But  it  is 
evident  that  such  a  belief  differs  in  each  individual  according 
to  his  experience,  and  according  to  his  habits  of  reasoning, 
and  even  according  to  his  facility  in  expression.  More* 
over,  knowledge  and  belief  differ  also  in  this,  that  knowl- 
edge places  us  in  the  presence  of  the  reality,  belief  only  in 
the  presence  of  a  proposition  concerning  it. 

Thus  John  and  James  are  friends.  John  knows  James 
through  a  long  intercourse.  He  is  just  as  certain  in  regard 
to  the  essential  character  of  James  as  he  is  about  his  own. 
But  if  he  tries  to  expi'ess  this  knowledge  of  James  in  the 
form  of  belief,  he  may  evidently  express  it  badly.  He  may 
fail  from  a  defective  analysis,  or  from  imperfect  powers  of 
language. 

On  the  other  hand  John  may  not  know  James  at  all.     He 


I 


THE   PRINCIPLE    OF    ORTHODOXY    EXAMINED.  41 

may  never  have  seen  him.  But  he  lias  heard  about  him 
from  a  mutual  frieud,  in  whose  judgment  he  trusts,  or  from 
several  persons,  and  so  he  has  formed  a  very  decided  be- 
lief in  regard  to  James.  He  has  a  creed  about  him,  though 
he  has  never  known  him. 

In  the  same  way  those  who  know  God  truly  and  well,  by 
the  experience  of  obedience  and  prayer,  may  have  a  very 
erroneous  belief  concerning  him.  Those  who  do  not  know 
him  at  all,  by  any  personal  experience,  may  have  a  very 
correct  belief  concerning  him.  But  which  saves  the  soul? 
Which  governs  the  life?  "WTiich  affects  the  heart?  Evi- 
dently not  the  belief,  but  the  knowledge. 

We  are  not  saved  by  any  belief  whatsoever  concerning 
God  or  Christ,  concerning  sin  or  salvation,  concerning  duty 
or  destiny.  Belief  brings  vis  into  contact  with  the  images  of 
things,  not  the  things  themselves.  Belief  has  no  saving 
power.  But  knowledge  has.  "  This  is  life  eternal,  to  KNOW 
thee,  the  only  true  God,  and  Jesus  Christ,  whom  thou  hast 
sent." 

It  is  therefore  a  great  mistake  when  Orthodoxy  or  Ration- 
alism reverses  the  axiom  of  John,  and  instead  of  saying, 
"  Life  is  the  light  of  man,"  tells  us  that  "  Light  is  the  life  of 
man."  Knowledge  comes  from  life.  Belief  comes  from 
knowledge,  and  not  the  contrary. 

The  Principle  of  Orthodoxy,  as  stated  at  the  commence- 
ment of  this  chapter  (in  §  1),  is,  that  there  is  one  true  sys- 
tem of  Christian  doctrine,  and  that  all  others  are  false.  The 
Idea  of  Orthodoxy,  as  stated  in  §  10  of  this  chapter,  is,  that 
the  soul  is  saved  by  the  sight  of  truth.  The  idea  of  Ortho- 
doxy is  true  —  its  principle  is  false.  The  sight  of  truth  — 
that  is,  of  the  great  spiritual  realities  —  saves  us,  for  only  by 
that  sight  are  we  lifted  above  our  ieeble  and  imperfect  selves, 
and  enabled  to  partake  of  the  nature  of  God.  But  while 
truth  is  ever  one  and  the  same,  doctrine  varies  from  age  to 
age,  varies  from  man  to  man.  Each  man's  statement  is 
4* 


42      ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

limited  by  his  position,  his  mode  of  thought,  his  power  of 
speech.  Nor  can  any  council,  assembly,  conference,  synod 
escape  from  similar  limitations. 

Let  the  distinction  be  once  clearly  recognized  between 
truth  as  seen  and  truth  as  stated,  —  between  knowledge  and 
belief,  —  and  we  see  the  end  of  dogmatism,  bigotry,  intoler- 
ance, and  superstition.  We  shall  then  see  that  religion  is 
one  thing  and  theology  quite  another,  and  that  the  test  and 
evidence  of  a  sound  religious  experience  are  not  what  a  man 
says,  but  what  he  is.  The  sight  of  truth  remains,  as  always, 
the  source  of  our  moral  and  spiritual  life,  but  this  sight  of 
truth  must  pass  into  knowledge,  by  means  of  life,  in  order  to 
renew  the  soul.  Faith,  or  the  act  by  which  the  soul,  de- 
sirous of  good,  puts  itself  in  the  presence  of  truth,  is  always 
the  beginning  of  each  spiritual  state.  Knowledge,  born  of 
this  faith,  through  repeated  acts  of  conscience,  love,  obedi- 
ence, prayer,  is  the  next  step,  and  that  which  fixes  the  truth 
in  the  soul.  Belief  comes  afterwards,  resulting  from  the 
knowledge  thus  obtained,  analyzed,  and  arranged  by  the  sys- 
tematizing intellect.  And  theory,  or  opinion,  goes  forward, 
like  the  skirmishers  before  an  army,  examining  the  route 
and  opening  the  way,  but  incapable  of  resisting  any  attack, 
or  holding  permanently  any  position. 


NATURAL  AND  REVEALED  RELIGION.       43 


CHAPTER  III. 

THE  ORTHODOX  IDEA  OF  NATURAL  AND  REVEALED  RELI- 
GION; OR,  NATURALISM  AND  SUPERNATURALISM. 

§  1.  Meaning  of  Natural  and  Supernatural. — Orthodox 
Christianity  claims  that  Christianity  is  a  supernatural  reve- 
lation, consisting  of  truths  revealed  by  God,  not  according 
to  the  method  of  nature,  but  outside  of  it.  But  not  merely 
the  orthodox,  the  heterodox  too,  Unitarians,  Universalists, 
Quakers,  SAvedenborgians,  all  hold  to  Christianity  as  a 
supernatural  faith.  What  do  they  mean  by  this,  and  v^hy 
do  they  insist  on  it  so  strongly?  This  is  our  first  ques- 
tion, and  the  next  will  be,  "  What  do  those  who  hold  to 
naturalism  mean  by  it,  and  why  do  they  insist  on  their 
view?" 

The  distinction  between  the  two  seems  to  be  this :  Tho 
naturalists  in  theology  assert  that  God  comes  to  man  through 
nature,  and  nature  only;  the  supernaturalist  declares  that 
God  comes  to  man,  not  only  through  nature,  but  also  by 
other  methods  outside  of  nature,  or  above  nature.  There  is 
no  question  between  them  as  to  natural  religion.  Both  ad- 
mit that ;  supernaturalists  believe  all  that  naturalists  believe, 
only  they  believe  something  more. 

But  how  is  nature  to  be  defined?  What  is  meant  by 
nature  ?  Various  definitions  are  given  ;  but  we  wish  for  one 
now  which  shall  really  express  the  issue  taken  in  this  con- 
troversy. So  we  may  define  nature  as  law.  All  the  nexus 
or  web  of  existing  substances  and  forces  which  are  under 
law  belong  to  nature.  All  that  happens  outside  of  these 
laws  is  either  preternatural,   unnatural,   subternatural,  or 


44      ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

supernatural.  If  it  is  something  outside  of  law,  but  not  vio- 
lating it,  wor  coming  from  a  higher  source,  we  call  it  preter- 
natural ;  like  magic,  ghosts,  sorcery,  fairies,  genii,  and  the 
like.  What  violates  law  is  wnnatural.  What  is  so  low 
down  that  it  lies  below  law,  as  chaos  before  creation ;  or 
nebulous  matter  not  yet  beginning  to  obey  the  law  of  gravita- 
tion ;  or  intelligences,  like  Mephistopheles  or  Satan,  who 
have  sunk  so  low  in  sin  as  to  have  lost  the  perception  of 
right  and  wrong,  is  subternatural,  heloio  nature.  What 
belongs  to  a  religion  above  the  laws  of  time  and  space, 
above  the  finite,  is  supernaturaL 

Thus  brutes,  and  men  like  bnites,  who  are  below  the 
moral  law,  are  suhternatural  as  regards  that  law.  We  do 
not  call  it  a  sin  in  a  tiger  to  kill  a  man,  for  he  is  helow  law 
as  regards  sin.  He  is  below  the  moral  law.  Again,  we 
can  conceive  of  angels  so  high  up  as  to  be  above  the  moral 
law,  in  part  of  its  domain,  not  capable  either  of  common 
virtue  or  of  common  sin,  according  to  our  standards  of 
morality,  though  perhaps  under  some  higher  code  of  ethics. 
They  are  supernatural  beings  as  regards  that  law  —  the 
moral  law  of  this  world.  As  regards  some  parts  of  the 
moral  law,  there  are,  no  doubt,  multitudes  of  human  beings 
above  it  even  in  this  world.  There  are  many  persons  quite 
incapable  of  swearing,  lying,  stealing,  getting  drunk,  flying 
into  a  passion,  and  to  whom,  therefore,  it  is  no  virtue  to 
avoid  these  vices.  They  are  simply  above  that  part  of  the 
moral  law.  They  are  supernatuTid  beings  as  respects  that 
part  of  human  character. 

After  these  illustrations,  we  can  see  what  is  meant  by 
supernaturalism.  If  there  is  anything  in  this  world  which 
comes  from  above  the  world,  and  not  from  the  existing  laws 
of  being,  that  is  supernatural. 

§  2.  The  Creation  Supernatural.  —  In  this  sense,  all  but 
atheists  must  admit  the  supernatural.  If,  for  example,  you 
ftdmit  the  creation  of  the  world  by  God,  that  was  a  super- 


NATURAL  AND  REVEALED  RELIGION.        45 

natural  act ;  that  did  not  come  from  the  existing  laws  of  the 
world,  because  it  created  those  laws.  All  the  -order  and 
beauty  of  the  world,  its  variety  and  harmony,  its  infinite 
adaptation  of  part  to  part,  and  each  to  all,  —  these  existed 
in  Grod's  mind  before  they  existed  in  nature.  They  were 
supernatural,  as  ideas,  before  they  appeared  in  nature  as 
facts.  And  if,  as  most  geologists  suppose,  the  crust  of  the 
earth  denotes  a  long  series  of  creations,  successive  epochs, 
at  the  close  of  each  of  which  new  forms  of  vegetable  and 
animal  life  appeared,  then  each  of  these  was  a  new  crea- 
tion ;   that  is,  a  new  supernatural  act  of  the  Almighty. 

The  physical  world,  therefore,  shows  a  power  above  itself. 
The  natural  testifies  to  the  supernatural,  the  all  to  the  over- 
all. The  existing  web  of  laws  gives  evidence  of  mind,  out- 
side of  itself,  above  itself,  arranging  and  governing  it. 

§  3.  The  Question  stated.  —  This  being  granted,  the 
question  between  naturalism  and  supernaturalism  is,  whether 
this  superintending  mind,  which  came  from  above  the  world 
into  it  by  acts  of  creation,  when  the  world  was  made,  has  or 
has  not  come  into  it  subsequently.  We  have  a  series  of 
creations  down  to  the  time  that  man  arrived  on  the  earth. 
When  he  came,  he  was  a  supernatural  being,  and  his  coming 
a  supernatural  event.  Unless  we  assume  that  he  was  devel- 
oped, by  existing  laws,  out  of  some  ape,  gorilla,  or  chimpan- 
zee, his  coming  was  supernatural.  Now,  did  supernatural 
events  cease  then,  and  since  that  time  has  the  world  gone  on 
of  itself?  or  have  there  been  subsequent  incursions  from  a 
higher  sphere  —  a  new  influx  from  above,  from  time  to 
time,  adding  something  new  to  nature?  Naturalism  says 
no ;    supernaturalism  says  yes. 

§  4.  Argument  of  the  Supernaturalist  from  successive  GeO' 
logic  Creations.  —  The  supernaturalist  says,  God  comes  to 
us  in  both  ways  —  through  nature  ;  that  is,  through  the  order 
of  things  already  established  ;  and  also  by  new  creative 
impulses,  coming  in,  from  time  to  time,  from  above.     He 


46     orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

contends  that  such  a  new  creative  impulse  came  into  the 
world  through  Jesus  Christ,  adding  a  new  substance  and  new 
forms  to  those  already  existing  —  a  new  life  not  before  in  the 
world,  proceeding  according  to  new  laws.  This  new  creation, 
as  the  Scriptures  themselves  term  it,  is  Christianity.  This  is 
also  said  to  be  in  analogy  with  the  course  of  events.  For,  if 
there  has  been  a  series  of  creations  before,  bringing  animals 
into  the  world,  and  higher  forms  of  physical  life,  —  if  these 
have  been  created  by  new  supernatural  impulses  coming  in 
at  intervals  of  hundreds  of  thousands  of  years,  —  why  deny 
that  another  impulse  may  have  come  in  four  thousand  years, 
or  forty  thousand  years,  after  man  was  created,  to  add  a  new 
form  of  spiritual  life  to  society? 

In  the  world,  as  it  was  at  first,  there  was  not  a  living  plant 
or  animal ;  after  thousands  of  years,  or  millions  of  years, 
there  came  into  the  broad  seas  of  the  lower  Silurian  epoch, 
some  of  the  lowest  kinds  of  animals  and  seaweeds,  a  few 
trilobites  and  mollusks,  but  no  plants  save  fucoids.  Next 
came,  after  a  long  time,  a  few  cartilaginous  fishes  and  corals. 
A  long  time  passed  —  thousands  of  years  rolled  by:  then 
came  real  fishes  and  land  plants  in  what  is  called  the  Devo- 
nian period,  or  the  old  red  sandstone.  After  a  great  while 
came  the  period  to  which  belongs  all  the  coal  formation  ;  and 
in  that  carboniferous  epoch  first  appears  a  whole  vegetable 
world  of  trees  and  plants,  to  the  number  of  nine  hundred 
and  thirty-four  species.  Some  insects  arrived  at  this  time,  as 
beetles,  crickets,  and  cockroaches,  which  are,  therefore,  much 
more  venerable  than  man.  More  thousands  of  years  go  by  : 
then  the  earth  receives  a  new  creation  in  the  form  of  gigantic 
frogs,  enormous  reptiles,  and  strange  fishes.  But  as  yet  no 
mammal  has  come  —  not  a  bird  nor  a  quadruped  has  been 
seen  on  the  earth.  Then,  after  another  long  period,  these 
appear,  in  what  is  called  the  tertiary  period ;  until,  at  last, 
some  remains  of  man  are  found,  in  the  diluvium,  or  gravel. 
Geology  thus,  once  thought  to  be  atheistic,  gives  its  testi- 


NATURAL  AND  REVEALED  RELIGION.        47 

roony  to  a  long  series  of  supernatural  facts ;  that  is,  to 
the  successive  creation,  after  long  intervals,  of  entirely  new 
genera  and  species  of  vegetables  and  animals.  As  you  turn 
these  great  stone  leaves  of  that  majestic  manuscript  roll 
written  by  God's  hand,  which  we  call  the  earth,  you  find  ho. 
has  been  writing  new  things  on  each  page,  new  facts  and 
laws,  not  on  any  former  leaf.  New  types  of  life,  not  pre- 
pared for  by  any  previous  one,  —  by  no  slow  evolution,  but 
by  a  sudden  step,  —  break  in."  On  the  previous  rocky  page 
is  to  be  found  not  one  of  their  species,  genus,  order,  or  even 
class,  to  point  back  to  any  possible  progenitor.  So  that  the 
globe  itself  says,  from  these  eternal  monuments  of  rock, 
"  Behold  the  history  of  supernatual  events  written  on  me." 
Each  creation  is  higher  than  the  last :  finally  man  is  created. 
But  still  from  above,  from  outside  the  world,  the  creative 
life  is  ready  to  be  poured  in.  Only  the  next  ci-eation  is  to 
be  moral  and  spiritual,  not  physical.  No  new  physical 
forms  are  now  added,  but  a  new  moral  life  is  poured  into 
man,  making  hivi  a  new  creation  of  God.  "  For  if  any  man 
is  in  Christ,  he  is  a  new  creature."  The  analogy  was  so 
striking,  that  the  apostles  noticed  it,  and  constantly  speak  of 
Christ  as  the  medium  of  a  new  creation. 

§  5.  Supernatural  Argument  from  Human  Freedom.  — 
But  there  is  another  example  of  the  supernatural  element  in 
the  world.  Dr.  Bushnell,  in  his  book  called  "  Nature  and 
the  Supernatural,"  contends  that  man  is  capable  of  super- 
natural acts  ;  that,  in  fact,  every  really /ree  act  is,  and  must 
be,  a  supernatural  act.  To  those  who  hold  the  doctrine  of 
necessity,  this  is,  of  course,  no  argument.  But  they  who 
believe,  in  the  testimony  of  their  own  consciousness,  that 
they  are  free  beings  ;  who  feel  that  they  are  not  dragged 
helplessly  by  the  strongest  motive,  but  can  resist  it  or  yield 
to  it ;  who,  therefore,  feel  themselves  responsible  for  what 
they  do,  or  omit  to  do,  they  can  see  that  in  a  real  sense 
they  create  new  influences.     Their  actions  are  not  results  of 


48      ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

previous  causes,  but  are  new  causes,  not  before  in  the  world. 
Some  supernatural  power  dwells  in  man's  will  just  as  far  as 
it  is  made  free  by  reason  and  choice.  Man  stands  between 
good  and  evil,  right  and  wrong,  truth  and  error,  with  the 
power  of  choosing  either  one  or  the  other.  If  he  chooses 
one,  he  sends  a  power  into  society,  life,  humanity,  to  help  it 
forward ;  if  the  other,  he  sends  in  a  power  to  hold  it  back. 
This  power  is  not  from  man's  nature,  but  from  something  in 
him  outside  his  nature.  When  he  acts  from  habit,  impulse, 
passion,  and  not  from  choice,  he  is  simply  a  natural  being ; 
when  he  acts  from  choice,  he  is  not  a  natural  being,  but 
either  a  sw/iernatural  or  a  subterneiturid  being,  according  as  he 
chooses  good  or  evil.  When  he  chooses  good,  he  rises  above 
the  natural  man  into  the  sphere  of  angels ;  when  he  chooses 
evil,  he  sinks  below  the  natural  man  into  the  sphere  of  brutes 
or  demons. 

§  6.  Supernatural  Events  not  necessarily  Violations  of 
Law.  —  Now,  says  the  supernaturalist,  if  we  have  all  this 
evidence  to  show  that  God  not  only  acts  through  nature,  by 
carrying  on  existing  forces  and  laws,  but  also  has  repeatedly 
come  into  nature  with  new  creations,  not  there  before,  —  and  if 
even  man  himself  has  a  certain  limited  but  strictly  supernatural 
power,  so  as  to  be  able  to  stand  outside  of  the  nexus  of  law. 
and  act  upon  it,  —  why  deny,  as  incredible,  that  God  should 
have  made  a  new  moral  creation  in  Christianity?  should 
have  created  a  new  class,  order,  genus,  and  species  of  spii'it- 
ual  beings,  not  represented  before  by  any  existing  congeners  ? 
And  why  question  that  what  we  call  miracles  —  that  is,  physi- 
cal interferences  with  natural  laws  —  should  have  attended  this 
sudden  influx  of  spiritual  life  ?  We  do  not  claim,  says  the 
judicious  supernaturalist  (like  Dr.  Bushnell,  for  example), 
that  miracles  are  suspensions  or  violations  of  natural  laws ; 
but  that  they  are  the  natural  modification  of  the  agency  of 
such  laws  by  a  new  and  powerful  influence.  Of  this,  too, 
there  is  ample  analogy  in  natui'e.  The  mineral  kingdom, 
for  example,  is  passively  subject  to  mechanical  and  chemical 


NATURAL  AND  REVEALED  RELIGION.        49 

laws,  which  are  resisted  and  modified  by  plants  and  animals. 
A  stone  obeys  passively  the  law  of  gravitation  ;  a  plant  re- 
sists it,  rises  into  the  air  in  opposition  to  it.  Such  a  pro- 
ceeding on  the  part  of  a  plant  must  seem  to  a  stone  a  pure 
miracle.  If  a  piece  of  granite  should  write  a  book  of  theol- 
ogy, it  would  probably  say  that  the  plant,  in  growing  up, 
had  violated  or  suspended  a  law  of  nature.  But  it  has  not. 
The  force  of  gravitation  has  worked  on  according  to  its  own 
law  ;  it  has  been  dragging  the  plant  downward  all  the  time, 
only  the  vital  power  in  the  plant  has  overcome  its  force,  and 
modified  the  result.  And,  again,  a  tree,  seeing  a  dog  run  to 
and  fro,  might  call  that  a  miracle.  The  tree,  unable  to 
move  from  its  place,  could  not  conceive  of  the  possibility  of 
voluntary  motion.  But  no  law  of  nature  is  violated  ;  only  a 
higher  power  comes  in  —  the  power  of  animal  life. 

To  a  dog,  again,  the  proceedings  of  a  man  are  strictly 
miraculous.  To  plant  corn,  reap  it,  thresh  it,  grind  it,  and 
bake  bread  out  of  it,  is  exactly  as  much  a  miracle  to  the 
dog,  as  the  multiplication  of  loaves,  or  turning  water  into 
wine,  by  Christ,  is  a  miracle  to  us.  But  no  law  of  nature 
was  violated  in  either  case.  Reason  in  the  one  case,  some 
profounder  spiritual  powder  in  the  other,  may  have  modi- 
fied the  usual  operation  of  law,  and  produced  these  results. 

The  Orthodox  supei'naturalist  therefore  contends  that  the 
supernatural  is  a  constant  element  of  life.  Higher  natures 
are  all  supernatural  to  lower  natures,  but  natural  in  them- 
selves, because  obedient  to  the  laws  of  their  ow'n  nature. 
Nature,  without  this  supernatural  element,  is  only  a  machine, 
of  which  God,  standing  outside,  turns  the  handle.  This  is 
a  low  conception  both  of  nature  and  of  God.  As  Goethe 
says,  in  one  of  his  immortal  lyrics,  — 

'  Not  80,  outside,  doth  the  Creator  linger, 
Nor  let  the  all  of  things  run  round  his  finger, 
But  moves  its  centre,  not  its  outer  rim; 
Comes  down  to  nature,  draws  it  up  to  him; 
Moving  within,  inspiring  from  above. 
With  currents  ever  new  of  light  and  love." 


60      ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

§  7.  Life  and  History  contain  Supernatural  Events.  —  And 
besides  all  this,  says  the  supernaturalist,  we  have  contin- 
ued and  constant  evidences,  in  all  history  and  in  all  human 
experience,  of  the  existence  of  this  supernatural  element. 
Only  a  small  minority  of  mankind  have  ever  doubted  it ; 
and  those  are  men  so  immersed  in  physical  science,  or  so 
hampered  by  some  logical  manacles,  or  so  steeped  in  purely 
worldly  affairs,  as  to  be  incapable  of  seeing  the  supernatural 
facts  which  are  recurrent  evermore.  Christianity  itself  has 
been  an  uninterrupted  series  of  supernatural  events.  The 
physical  miracles  of  Christ  are  nothing  to  the  spiritual 
miracles  which  Christianity  is  always  working.  Bad  men 
are  made  good,  weak  men  strong,  cowardly  men  brave, 
ignorant  and  foolish  men  wise,  by  a  supernatural  influence 
given  in  answer  to  prayer,  poured  down  into  hearts  and 
minds  which  open  themselves  to  receive  it.  The  conversion 
of  a  bad  man  by  the  power  of  Christianity  is  a  miracle. 
The  power  of  faith,  hope,  love,  which  every  Christian  has 
experienced,  coming  into  him,  not  through  any  operation  of 
his  nature,  but  simply  poured  into  his  soul  from  some  higher 
sphere,  —  this  makes  all  argument  unnecessary  to  one  who  has 
had  ever  so  little  Christian  experience. 

This  is  the  substance  of  Orthodox  supernaturalism ;  and 
this  seems  to  me  to  be  its  truth,  separated  from  its  errors. 

The  naturalism  of  the  present  time  we  conceive  to  be  partly 
directed  against  a  false  supernaturalism,  and  partly  to  be  a 
mistake  arising  from  a  too  exclusive  attention  to  the  order 
of  the  universe,  as  expressed  in  laiv. 

§  8.  The  Error  of  Orthodox  Supernaturalism.  —  Super- 
naturalism has  generally  disregarded  God  in  nature,  and 
only  sees  him  in  revelation.  It  has  allowed  a  sort  of 
natural  religion,  but  only  in  the  way  of  an  argument  to 
prove  the  existence  of  God  by  what  he  did  a  long  time  ago. 
But  it  has  not  gone  habitually  to  nature  to  see  God  there, 
incarnate  in  sun,  moon,  and  stars ;  incorporate   in   spring, 


NATURAL  AND  REVEALED  RELIGION.        51 

summer,  autumu,  and  wiater ;  in  day  and  niglit ;  in  the 
human  soul,  reason,  love,  will,  God  has  been  all  around  us, 
never  far  from  us  ;  but  theology  has  only  been  willing  to  see 
him  in  Jewish  history,  in  sacred  books,  or  on  Sundays  in 
church.  Let  us  see  him  there  all  we  can,  but  see  him  also 
in  every  rippling  brook,  in  every  tender  flower,  in  all  beauty, 
all  sublimity,  all  arrangement  and  adaptation  of  this  world. 
.No  wonder  that  naturalism  should  come  to  do  what  the 
Church  has  left  undone  —  to  find  its  God  and  Father  in  this 
great  and  wonderful  world  which  he  has  made  for  us.  The 
creed  says,  "  God  the  Father,  God  the  Son,  and  God  the 
Holy  Ghost ;  "  that  is,  God  the  Creator^  seen  in  Nature  and 
Providence  ;  God  the  Redeemer,  seen  in  Christianity ;  and 
God  the  Sanctijjer,  seen  in  every  righteous  and  holy  soul. 
But  the  Church  lias  neglected  its  own  creed,  and  omitted 
God  the  Creator,  often  also  God  the  Sanctifier,  and  has  only 
seen  God  in  Christianity,  in  its  history,  its  Church,  its  doc- 
trines, its  ceremonies.*  Against  this,  naturalism  comes  as 
a  great  and  needed  protest,  and  calls  us  to  see  God  also  in 
nature  and  life. 

Then  the  Church  has  been  too  apt  to  teach  a  miraculous 
revelation,  in  which  the  miracles  are  violations  of  law. 
But  as  God  is  confessedly  the  author  of  law,  it  has  made 
the  Deity  violate  his  own  laws  ;  that  is,  has  made  him  incon- 
sistent, arbitrary,  irregular,  and  wilful.  Deep  in  the  human 
mind  God  has  himself  rooted  a  firm  faith  in  the  immuta- 
bility of  law ;  so  that  when  miracles  are  thus  defined, 
naturalism  justly  objects  to  them. 

§  9.  No  Conflict  between  Naturalism  and  Supernatural- 
ism.  —  But  between  true  naturalism  and  true  supernaturalism 
we  do  not  think  there  need  be  any  war.  We  know  that  there 
are  many  men  so  rooted  in  their  faith  in  nature,  that  they 
cannot  see  anything  outside  of  it,  or  beyond  it.     To  them 

•  See  "  Broken  LlghtB,"  p.  207,  note. 


62  orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

God  is  law,  and  law  only.  Even  creation  is  repugnant  to 
them,  because  they  see  that  creation  is  really  a  supernatural 
thing.  Hence  come  the  theories  of  development ;  the  "  Ves- 
tiges of  Creation  ;  "  the  nebular  hypothesis  ;  the  Darwinian 
theory  of  formation  of  species  by  natural  selection ;  the 
notion  of  man  coming  out  of  an  ape  ;  pantheistic  notions  of 
a  God  so  immersed  in  nature  as  to  be  not  its  intelligent 
guide,  but  only  its  unconscious  soul ;  the  whole  universe 
proceeding  according  to  an  order  which  is  just  as  much 
above  God's  knowledge  as  above  ours.  Now,  the  best  geolo- 
gists assure  us  that  there  is  no  evidence  in  support  of  the 
transmutation  of  species.  Mr.  Darwin's  theory  of  the  for- 
mation of  species  by  natural  selection  is  this  :  In  the  strug- 
gle for  life,  the  strongest  and  best  adapted  animal  lives,  the 
rest  die.  This  animal  transmits  to  its  offspring  its  own 
superior  qualities  ;  so  a  higher  animal  is  gradually  developed. 
For  example,  the  giraffe  was  not  made  by  God  with  a  long 
neck  in  order  that  it  might  browse  on  the  leaves  of  high 
trees.  But  when  leaves  were  scarce,  the  animal  who  hap- 
pened to  have  a  neck  a  little  longer  than  the  rest  was  able 
to  get  leaves.  So  he  lived,  and  the  rest  died.  His  children 
had  longer  necks  by  the  law  of  hereditary  transmission. 
So,  in  the  course  of  ages,  animals  were  gradually  found 
with  very  long  necks.  Thus  the  walrus  has  a  curved 
horn  growing  downwards  from  his  lower  jaw,  by  Avhich  he 
climbs  on  to  the  floating  ice.  We  must  not  suppose,  how- 
ever, that  God  gave  him  the  tusk  for  that  purpose  ;  but  the 
walrus,  or  seal,  who  happened  to  have  a  little  horny  bone 
under  his  chin,  could  climb  on  the  ice  and  get  his  food  more 
easily,  and  so  he  lived,  while  the  rest  died  ;  and  his  de- 
scendants in  the  course  of  a  few  hundreds  of  thousands  of 
years  came,  by  repeating  this  process,  to  have  horns ;  and 
so  this  species  of  phoca  arrived. 

It  is  certainly  possible   to  believe  this  theory.     But  in 
believing  it  we  have  to  suppose  two  things ;  first,  a  happy 


NATURAL  AND  REVEALED  RELIGION.        53 

accident,  and  then  a  law  of  transmission  of  hereditary  quali- 
ties. Now,  the  theory  substitutes  this  law  of  transmission 
and  these  happy  accidents  fpr  the  creative  design.  Is  any- 
thing gained  thereby?  The  domain  of  law  is  extended  a 
little.  But  extend  it  as  much  as  you  will,  you  must  at  last 
come  to  something  above  law.  Suppose  these  laws  by  which 
walrus  and  giraffe  came,  were  all  in  the  original  nebula,  so 
that  no  Creator  has  been  needed  since,  and  nothing  super- 
natural —  nature  has  done  it  all  since.  But  who  put  the  laws 
there  to  begin  with  ?  You  have  to  take  the  supernatural  at 
last,  or  else  suppose  an  accident  to  begin  with.  Accidentally, 
all  these  wonderful  laws  happened  to  be  in  a  particular 
nebula.  He  who  shrinks  from  this  supposition  accepts  the 
supernatural,  all  at  once,  at  the  beginning,  instead  of  the 
supernatural  all  the  way  along.  What  does  he  gain  by  it? 
He  gains  merely  this,  that  he  puts  the  Creator  out  of  sight ; 
or  rather,  puts  himself  out  of  sight  of  the  Ci'eator.  He 
worships  the  great  god  Developmeiit  instead. 

Equally  satisfactory  to  the  intellect,  to  say  the  least,  and 
much  more  satisfactory  to  the  best  human  instincts,  is  the 
view  of  God  which  sees  him  coming  evermore  into  nature 
from  above  nature.  This  view  says,  "  Grod  is  not  only 
order,  but  also  freedom.  He  is  not  only  law,  but  also  love. 
He  is  in  the  Avorld  as  law  and  order,  but  he  is  above  the 
world  as  thought  and  love ;  as  Providence,  as  the  heavenly 
Father.  He  comes  to  us  to  meet  our  exigencies,  to  inspire 
our  doubting  hearts,  to  lift  us  into  life  and  light.  He  does 
not  set  a  grand  machine  going,  and  then  look  on  and  see  it 
work ;  but  he  is  in  the  world,  and  with  us  always.  The 
supernatural  dwells  by  the  side  of  the  natural.  Just  as  a 
wise  and  good  father  has  rules  and  laws  by  which  to  govern 
his  children  —  rewarding  and  punishing  them  as  they  obey 
or  disobey  ;  but  besides  that,  does  a  thousand  things  for  them, 
taking  the  initiative  himself;  so  God  governs  us  by  law,  but 
5* 


64  OETHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

also  often  takes  the  initiative,  giving  us  what  we  never  asked 
for,  and  kpew  nothing  of." 

§  10.  Further  Errors  of  Orthodox  Supernaturalism  — 
Gulf  between  Christianity  and  all  other  Religions.  —  Ortho- 
doxy has  erred,  as  it  would  seem,  in  placing  too  great  a  gulf 
between  Christianity  and  all  other  religions.  Christianity  is 
sufficiently  distinguished  from  all  other  religions  by  being 
regarded  as  the  perfect,  and  therefore  universal,  religion  of 
mankind.  It  is  to  all  preceding  religions  what  man  is  to  all 
previous  races.  These  are  separated  from  man  by  various 
indelible  characters ;  yet  they  are  his  fellow-creatures,  pro- 
ceeding from  the  same  creative  mind,  according  to  one  crea- 
tive plan.  So  the  previous  religions  of  our  race  —  Fetich- 
ism,  Brahmauism,  Buddhism,  the  .religion  of  Confucius,  of 
Zoroaster,  of  Egypt,  of  Scandinavia,  of  Judea,  of  Greece 
and  Rome  —  are  distinguished  from  Christianity  by  indelible 
characters  ;  but  they,  too,  proceeded  from  the  same  creative 
mind,  according  to  one  creative  plan,  Christianity  should 
regard  these  humanely,  as  its  fellow-creatures.  The  other 
animals  prepared  man's  way  on  the  earth,  and  since  man's 
arrival  we  have  seen  no  subsequent  creation.  So  the  ethnic 
religions  prepared  the  way  for  Christianity,  and  since  Chris- 
tianity came  no  new  religion  has  appeared ;  for  Moham- 
lAedanism  is  only  a  melange  drawn  from  the  Old  and  New 
Testaments,  and  may  therefore  be  considered  as  an  outlying 
Christian  sect.  So,  too,  the  gigantic  abstractions  of  Gnos- 
ticism were  hybrid  systems,  formed  of  the  union  between 
Oriental  thought  and  Christian  life.  The  analogy  may  be 
traced  still  farther.  Man  is  the  only  animal  who  possesses 
the  whole  earth.  Every  other  race  has  its  habitat  in  some 
geographical  centre,  from  which  it  may  emigrate,  indeed,  to 
some  extent,  but  where  only  it  thrives.  To  man,  only,  the 
whole  earth  belongs.  So  the  primitive  religions  are  all 
ethnic;  that  is,  religions  of  races.  The  religion  of  Confu- 
cius belongs  to  China,  that  of  Brahmanism  to  India,  that  of 


NATURAL   AND    REVEALED   RELIGION.  65 

Zoroaster  to  the  Persians  ;  the  religion  of  Egypt  is  only  for 
the  Egyptians.  Exceptions  to  this  laAv  (like  that  of  Buddhism, 
for  example)  arc  only  apparent.  The  rule  is  invariable. 
Christianity  alone  is  a  cosmic  or  universal  religion.  It  only 
has  passed  the  boundaries  of  race,  so  inflexible  to  all  other 
religions.  Born  a  Semitic  religion,  it  soon  took  possession 
of  the  Indo-European  races,  converting  Romans,  Greeks, 
Teutons,  Kelts,  and  Sclaves.  It  finds  the  African  mind 
docile  to  its  influence.  Its  missionaries  have  made  believers 
from  among  the  races  of  America,  India,  China,  and  the 
Pacific  Islands.  It  is  e%'idently  destined  to  be  the  religioa 
of  humanity. 

But,  if  so,  why  should  it  be  put  into  antagonism  -with  the 
religions  which  preceded  it?  These  are  also  creations  of 
God,  not  the  work  of  man.  Theologians  have  found  multi- 
tudes of  types  of  Christ  in  Jewish  books  and  Jewish  history. 
But  they  might  also  find  types  of  Christianity  in  the  so-called 
heathen  religions.  For  as  coming  events  cast  their  shadows 
before,  so  coming  revelations  arc  seen  beforehand  in  shadowy 
preludes  and  homologous.  The  lofty  spiritualism  of  the  Brah- 
manical  books,  the  moral  devotion  of  the  Zendavesta,  the 
law  of  the  soul's  progress  in  Buddhism,  —  these  are  all  types 
of  what  was  to  appear  in  a  greater  ftdness  and  higher  devel- 
opment in  Christianity.  First  the  natural,  afterwards  that 
which  is  spii'itual.  But  these  foregleams  of  Christian  truth, 
irradiating  the  night-side  of  history,  are  all  touching  proofs 
that  God  never  leaves  liimself  without  a  witness  in  the 
world  or  in  human  hearts. 

Instead,  therefore,  of  placing  an  impassable  gulf  between 
Christianity  and  other  human  religions,  we  should  consider 
these  are  preparations  and  stepping-stones  to  something 
higher.  Nor  will  they  pass  away  until  Christianity  has 
purified  itself  from  the  errors  which  still  cling  to  it.  Juda- 
ism was  not  to  pass  till  it  was  fulfilled  in  Christianity ;  and 


56  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   ANI*   ERRORS. 

neither  will  the  other  religions  of  the  world  pass  away  till 
they  also  are  fulfilled  in  Christianity. 

Now,  the  common  teaching  in  our  churches  and  religious 
books  and  newspapers  tends  to  depreciate  all  natural  religion 
in  the  interest  of  revealed  religion.  It  is  commonly  said 
that  the  light  of  nature  helps  us  a  very  little  way  in  the 
knowledge  of  God.  "Look  at  the  heathen,"  it  is  said; 
"  see  their  religious  ignorance,  their  awful  superstitions, 
their  degrading  worship  of  idols,  and  their  subjection  to 
priestcraft.  This  is  your  boasted  light  of  nature,  and  these 
are  its  results  —  the  Fetichism  of  Africa,  the  devil-worship 
of  the  North  American  Indians,  the  cannibalism  of  the  Fee- 
jee  Islands,  the  human  sacrifices  of  Mexico  and  of  the  an- 
cient Phoenicia."  "  Then,"  it  is  continued,  "  look  at  the 
obseirations  of  the  wisest  intellects  apart  from  revelation ! 
How  little  they  knew  with  certainty !  Their  views  of  the 
Deity  varied  from  pantheism  to  idolatry ;  their  views  of  im- 
mortality were  wholly  vague  and  indistinct ;  their  ideas  of 
duty  confused  and  false." 

To  which  we  might  reply,  "  Is  not  the  same  thing  true 
among  Christians  ?  Are  there  no  superstitions  among  them  ? 
Were  not  witches  hanged  and  burned  during  sixteen  centuries 
in  Christendom?  If  the  heathen  are  ignorant,  what  multi- 
tudes in  Catholic  countries  also  do  not  read  the  Bible  !  How 
many  are  there  even  in  Protestant  churches  who  can  give  a 
reason  for  their  belief?  If  the  heathen  worship  degrades 
mankind  because  it  is  a  superstition,  with  fear  for  its  mo- 
tive, how  large  a  part  of  Christian  preaching  consists  also 
of  an  appeal  to  terror  I  Is  not  the  fear  of  everlasting  tor- 
ment in  hell  the  motive  power  of  much  which  is  called 
Christianity?  Consider  Catholics  eating  their  God:  is  that 
the  worship  of  the  Father  in  spirit  and  truth  ?  Think  of  the 
religious  wars,  of  the  religious  persecutions :  did  natui-al 
religion  ever  do  anything  as  bad  as  this?  We  cry  out 
against  Nero,  who  covered  Christians  with  pitch,  and  burned 


NATURAL   AND   REVEALED   RELIGION.  57 

them  as  torches  in  the  amphitheatre.  But  how  many  were 
thus  tortured?  Perhaps  ten,  perhaps  twenty,  or  let  us  say 
a  hundred.  But,  according  to  Llorente,  the  Holy  Office  of 
the  Inquisition,  in  Spain,  burned  alive,  under  Torqucmada, 
8800  ;  under  Deza,  1669  ;  under  Ximenes,  2536  ;  in  all, 
from  1483  to  1498,  —  that  is,  in  fifteen  years,  —  it  burned 
alive  31,912  persons  for  hei-esy,  and  subjected  to  rigorous 
pains  and  penalties  291,450  persons. 

It  is  not  right  to  judge  of  any  doctrine  by  the  corrupt 
practices  which  have  taken  place  under  it,  unless  it  can  be 
shown  that  these  are  its  legitimate  fruits.  We  maintain 
tliat  Christianity  is  not  fairly  responsible  for  these  persecu- 
tions ;  but  let  us  make  the  same  allowance  for  the  religions 
which  prepared  its  way. 

§  11.  GhristianiLy  considered  unnatural^  as  well  as  super- 
natural by  being  made  hostile  to  the  Nature  of  Man.  —  If  tho 
nature  of  man  be  regarded  as  wholly  evil,  then  Christianity 
is  not  merely  a  supernatural  religion,  but  an  unnatural  one. 
This  has  been  very  commonly  taught.  Man's  nature  has 
been  declared  so  totally  corrupt  and  alien  from  all  good,  as 
to  be  radically  opposite  to  the  love  of  God  and  man.  Chris- 
tianity, therefore,  comes,  not  to  help  him  attain  that  which 
he  is  seeking  after,  but  to  change  his  whole  purpose  and 
aim  —  to  give  him  a  wholly  new  nature.  This  is  the  result 
of  the  doctrine  of  total  depravity,  so  long  taught  in  the 
Church  as  Orthodoxy.  It  has  taught  that  all  natural  ten- 
dencies and  desires  in  man  were  Avholly  evil,  and  to  be 
rooted  out.  It  has  thus  made  Christianity  unattractive,  an'^ 
has  driven  men  away  from  it.  But  of  this  it  is  not  neces 
sary  to  speak  here,  as  we  shall  discuss  this  doctrine  and  i*° 
influence  hereafter. 


68  ORTHODOXY:   ITS  TRUTHS   AND  ERRORS. 


CHAPTER    IV. 

TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS  AS  REGARDS  MIRACLES. 

§  1.  Tlie  Subject  stated.  Four  Questions  concerning  Mira- 
cles. —  In  considering  the  truth  and  error  in  the  Orthodox 
doctrine  concerning  miracles,  we  must,  first,  find  out  what 
this  doctrine  is ;  secondly,  see  what  objections  have  been 
urged  against  it ;  and  so,  lastly,  we  may  come  to  some  con- 
clusion as  to  where  the  truth  or  the  error  lies.  There  are, 
however,  four  distinct  questions  in  regard  to  miracles,  each 
of  which  may  be  considered  separately.  There  is  the  philo- 
sophic question,  or  definition  of  a  miracle,  which  asks,  What 
is  a  miracle?  Then  there  is  the  historical  question,  Avhich 
asks,  Did  such  facts  actually  occur  ?  Next  is  the  theological 
question,  What  are  the  value  and  weight  of  these  facts  in  de- 
termining our  Christian  belief?  And  lastly  comes  the  reli- 
gious question,  What  are  the  spiritual  meaning  of  miracles, 
and  their  influence  on  the  heart  and  life  ? 

§  2.  The  Definition  of  a  Miracle.  —  As  the  creeds  give  no 
authoritative  definition  of  a  miracle,  we  must  examine  indi- 
vidual statements,  in  order  to  get  the  Orthodox  idea. 

To  answer  the  question.  What  is  a  miracle  f  is  not  as  easy 
as  it  would  seem,  as  will  appear  from  considering  the  differ- 
ent definitions  given  by  different  authorities,  taking  first 
those  of  the  dictionary. 

Johnson.  '''•Miracle.  A  wonder — something  above  hu- 
man power.  (In  theology.)  An  effect  above  human  or 
natural  power,  performed  in  attestation  of  some  truth." 

Webster.    "  Miracle.    (In  theology.)    An  event  or  effect 


MIRACLES.  59 

contrary  to  the  established  constitution  and  course  of  things, 
jr  a  deviation  from  the  known  laws  of  nature  ;  a  supernatu- 
ral event." 

Robinson's  Bible  Dictionary.  "  Miracle.  A  sign,  won- 
der, prodigy.  These  terms  are  commonly  used  in  Scripture 
to  denote  an  action,  event,  or  effect,  superior  (or  contrary) 
fo  the  general  and  established  laws  of  nature.  And  tliey 
.-iro  given,  not  only  to  true  miracles,  Avrought  by  saints 
jr  prophets  sent  by  God,  but  also  to  the  false  miracles  of 
impostors,  and  to  Avonders  wrought  by  the  wicked,  by  false 
prophets  or  by  devils."  After  giving  examples  of  this  from  the 
Scriptures,  Robinson  adds,  "  Miracles  and  prodigies,  there- 
fore, are  not  always  sure  signs  of  the  sanctity  of  those  who 
perform  them,  nor  proofs  of  the  truth  of  the  doctrine  they 
deliver,  nor  certain  testimonies  of  their  divine  mission." 

American  Encyclopoedia.  Ilirade.  "  It  is  usually  de- 
fined to  be  a  deviation  from  the  course  of  nature.  But  this 
definition  seems  to  omit  one  of  the  elements  of  a  miracle, 
viz.,  that  it  is  an  event  produced  by  the  interposition  of  an 
intalligent  power  for  moral  purposes  ;  for,  otherwise,  we 
must  consider  every  strange  phenomenon,  which  our  knowl- 
edge wiU  not  permit  us  to  explain,  as  a  miraculous  event.  A 
revelation  is  itself  a  miracle.  If  one  claims  to  be  a  teacher 
from  God,  he  asserts  a  miraculous  communication  with  God  ; 
this  communication,  however,  cannot  be  visible,  and  visible 
miracles  may  therefore  be  necessary  to  give  credibility  to  his 
pretentions.  The  use,  then,  of  a  miraculous  interposition  in 
changing  the  usual  course  of  nature  is  to  prove  the  moral 
government  of  God,  and  to  explain  the  character  of  it." 

Theodore  Parker.     "  A  miracle  is  one  of  three  things. 

"1.  It  is  a  transgression  of  all  law  which  God  has  made  ;  or, 

"  2.  A  transgression  of  all  known  laws,  or  obedience  to  a 
law  which  we  may  yet  discover ;  or, 

"3.  A  transgression  of  all  law  kno"\vn  or  knowable  by  man, 
but  yet  in  conformity  with  some  law  out  of  our  reach." 


60  orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

He  says  that  a  miracle,  according  to  the  first  definition,  is 
impossible ,;  according  to  the  second  it  is  no  miracle  at  all ; 
but  that  there  is  no  antecedent  objection  to  a  miracle  accord- 
ing to  the  third  hypothesis. 

Pascal.  "  A  miracle  is  an  effect  which  exceeds  the  natu- 
ral force  of  the  means  employed  to  bring  it  about." 

Hume.     "  A  miracle  is  a  violation  of  a  law  of  nature." 

Dr.  Thomas  Brown.  "  A  miracle  is  as  little  contrary  to 
any  law  of  nature  as  any  other  phenomenon.  It  is  only  an 
extraordinary  event,  the  result  of  extraordinary  circum- 
stances ;  an  effect  that  indicates  a  power  of  a  higher  order 
than  those  we  are  accustomed  to  trace  in  phenomena  more 
familiar  to  us,  but  whose  existence  only  the  atheist  denies. 
It  is  a  new  consequent  of  a  new  antecedent." 

Horne's  Introduction  to  the  New  Testament.  "A 
miracle  defined  is  an  effect  or  event  different  from  the  estab- 
lished constitution  or  course  of  things,  or  a  sicjn  ohvious  to  the 
senses  that  God  has  interposed  this  power  to  control  the  estab- 
lished poivers  of  nature  (commonly  termed  the  laws  of  na- 
ture) ,  Avhich  effect  or  sign  is  wrought  either  by  the  immediate 
act,  or  by  the  assistance,  or  by  the  permission,  of  God,  and 
accompanied  with  a  previous  notice  or  declaration  that  it  is 
performed  according  to  the  purpose  and  by  the  power  of 
God, /or  the  proof  or  evidence  of  some  particular  doctrine,  or 
in  attestation  of  the  authority  or  divine  mission  of  some  par- 
ticular person."  —  Vol.  I.  p.  203. 

"  Since,  as  we  already  have  had  occasion  to  observe^,  the 
proper  effect  of  a  mii*acle  is  clearly  to  mark  the  divine  inter- 
position, it  must  thei'efore  have  characters  proper  to  indi- 
cate such  interposition  ;  and  these  criteria  are  six  in  number. 

"1.  It  is  required,  then,  in  the  first  place,  that  a  fact  or 
event  which  is  stated  to  be  miraculous  should  have  an  im- 
portant end,  worthy  of  its  author. 

"2.   It  must  be  instantaneously  and  publicly  performed. 

"  3.   It  must  be  sensible  (that  is,  obvious  to  the  senses)  and 


MIRACLES.  61 

easy  to  be  observed  ;  iu  other  words,  the  fact  or  event  must 
be  such  that  the  senses  of  maukind  can  clearly  and  fully 
judge  of  it. 

"  4.    It  must  be  independent  of  second  causes. 

"  5.  Not  only  public  monuments  must  be  kept  up,  but  some 
outward  actions  must  be  constantly  performed  in  memory  of 
the  fact  thus  publicly  wrought, 

"  G.  And  such  monuments  must  be  set  up,  and  such  actions 
and  observances  be  instituted,  at  the  very  time  when  those 
events  took  place,  and  afterwards  be  continued  without  inter- 
ruption."—Vol.  I.  p.  214  and  215. 

From  these  examples  we  may  see  what  different  definitions 
have  been  given  of  miracles,  and  that  the  definition  is  not  so 
easy  a  thing  as  one  might  at  first  suppose.  All  depends  on 
the  point  of  view  which  we  take.  If  we  look  only  at  the 
outward  fact,  a  miracle  is  a  Avonderful  event,  a  portent, 
something  out  of  the  common  course  of  nature,  and  unparal- 
leled in  common  human  experience.  But  if  we  look  at  it  as 
regards  the  character  of  him  who  works  the  miracle,  it  then 
becomes  a  supernatural  work,  or  a  preternatural  work,  hav- 
ing a  divine  or  a  demoniac  origin. 

But,  on  the  whole,  the  Orthodox  doctrine  of  a  miracle 
seems  to  be  this  —  that  it  is  a  wonderful  work,  contrary  to 
the  laws  of  nature,  wrought  by  the  direct  agency  of  God,  in 
proof  of  the  divine  commission  of  him  by  whom  it  is  done. 
The  two  essential  points  of  the  definition  are,  that  a  miracle 
is  contrary  to  the  laivs  of  nature  ;  and  that  it  is  the  only  logi- 
cal proof  of  the  divine  authority  of  the  miracle-ivorlcer.  We 
call  this  the  orthodox  definition,  although  we  must  admit 
that  no  one  in  modern  times  has  presented  this  view  more 
forcibly  and  decidedly  than  the  Unitarian  Andrews  Norton, 
and  though  many  Orthodox  men  have  taken  a  different 
view. 

§  3.  The  different  Explanations  of  the  Miracles  of  the  Bible, 
6 


62      ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

—  The  four  explanations  of  the  nairacles  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment (to  which  we  now  confine  ourselves)  are  these  :  — 

I.  Tlie  Natural  Explanation.  —  According  to  this,  the 
miraculous  facts  of  the  New  Testament  are  to  be  explained 
as  resulting  from  natural  causes.  They  are  on  the  plane  of 
our  common  human  life.  They  are  such  events  as  might 
easily  happen  anywhere  at  the  present  time.  Christ  himself 
was  but  a  natural  genius  of  a  high  order.  His  miracles  were 
merely  the  natural  results  of  his  intellect  and  strength  of 
will,  or  they  were  mistakes  on  the  part  of  the  observers  and 
narrators,  or  myths  which  have  grown  up  subsequently  in 
the  Church.  Great  ingenuity  has  been  used  in  attempting 
to  show  how  each  miracle  may  be  explained  so  as  to  be 
nothing  very  extraordinary,  after  all.  But  these  explana- 
tions are  often  very  forced.  Some  events  which  are  at  first 
sight  seemingly  miraculous,  are  often  explained  as  natural 
events  by  the  majority  of  commentators.  Thus  the  account 
of  the  angel  who  went  down  into  the  pool  and  troubled  the 
water  is  usually  interpreted  as  a  natural  phenomenon,  and  no 
real  miracle.  Modern  travellers  have  noticed  that  this  pool 
of  Bethesda  is  an  intermittent  spring,  which  may  have  pos- 
sessed medicinal  qualities. 

The  old-fashioned  naturalism,  however,  has  mostly  gone 
by.  Its  explanations  were  too  forced  and  unnatural  to  con- 
tinue long.  The  more  common  account  at  present  is  that 
which  assumes  that  the  narrators  were  mistaken  in  the  stories 
which  they  have  given  us.  Mr.  Parker  thinks  that  there  is 
not  sufficient  evidence  of  the  miracles.  If  there  were  more 
he  would  believe  them.  He  gives  no  explanation  of  their 
origin  farther  than  this.  But  Strauss  attempts  an  explana- 
tion based  upon  an  unconscious  action  of  the  fancy  and 
feelings  on  the  part  of  the  New  Testament  writers,  causing 
them  to  create  these  incidents  out  of  some  trifling  basis 
of  fact  or  of  history.  Renan  follows  in  the  same  general 
direction. 


MIRACLES.  68 

II.  The  Unnatural  Explanation. — A  miracle  is  a  viola- 
tion or  a  suspension  of  a  law  of  nature. 

This,  until  recently,  has  been  the  favorite  view  of  miracles 
among  theologians,  and  is  the  view  of  miracles  against  which 
the  arguments  of  those  who  reject  them  have  been  chiefly 
directed. 

The  arguments  in  favor  of  this  view  are  these  :  — 

1.  The  miracles  of  the  New  Testament  seevi  to  be  viola- 
tions of  laws  of  nature.  For  example :  the  turning  water 
into  wine  ;  healing  by  a  word  or  touch  ;  stilling  the  tempest ; 
feeding  five  thousand  ;  walking  on  the  sea  ;  transfiguration  ; 
raising  of  Lazarus  ;  Christ's  own  resurrection.  The  law  of 
gravitation  seems  to  have  been  suspended  when  he  walked 
on  the  sea,  &c. 

2.  Miracles  are  appealed  to  by  Christ  and  his  apostles  in 
proof  that  God  was  with  him.  But,  unless  these  miracles 
had  suspended  the  laws  of  nature,  they  would  not  be  proofs 
of  this. 

These  are  the  two  principal  reasons  for  this  view  of  mir- 
acles. 

Objections.  —  On  the  other  hand,  it  is  objected,  — 

1.  That  apparent  violations  may  not  be  real  violations  of 
the  laws  of  nature.  Examples :  The  Arab  emir  in  "  The 
Talisman  "  who  was  told  that  water  sometimes  became  solid, 
so  as  to  support  a  man  on  horseback ;  a  steamboat  sailing 
against  wind  and  current ;  the  telegraph  ;  the  daguerrotype. 
In  all  such  cases  the  laws  of  nature  are  not  violated  or  sus- 
pended, but  new  powers  come  in. 

2.  Christ  appeals  to  the  moral  character  of  his  miracles, 
and  not  merely  to  their  supernatural  character.  They  are 
miracles  of  benevolence. 

3.  If  the  proof  of  Christ's  mission  depends  on  this  view  of 
miracles,  it  can  never  be  proved.  "We  can  never  be  sure 
that  the  event  is  a  violation  of  a  law  of  nature. 


64      ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

4.  On  this  view  the  sceptic's  objections  to  miracles  are 
unanswerable. 

So  says  Dr.  Thomas  Brown,  in  an  article  reprinted  by  Dr. 
Noyes,  of  Cambridge,  in  the  "Theological  Essays"  pub- 
lished by  the  American  Unitarian  Association.  He  admits 
the  principle  of  Hume's  Essay  on  Miracles,  but  says  that  his 
error  lies  in  the  false  definition  of  the  miracle  as  a  violation 
of  the  laws  of  nature.     False,  because,  — 

(a.)  On  the  principle  of  continued  uniformity  of  sequence 
our  whole  belief  of  causation,  and  consequently  of  the  divine 
Being,  is  founded. 

(h.)  Gives  an  air  of  inconsistency,  and  almost  of  absurdity, 
to  a  miracle. 

(c.)  Laws  of  nature  are  not  violated  when  a  new  antecedent 
is  followed  by  a  new  consequent,  but  when,  the  antecedent 
being  exactly  the  same,  a  different  consequent  is  the  result. 

(cZ.)  No  testimony  could  prove  such  a  miracle.  Suppose 
testimony  so  strong  that  its  falsehood  would  be  an  absolute 
miracle  ;  then  we  should  have  to  believe,  in  either  case,  that 
a  law  of  nature  has  been  violated.  No  ground  of  preference 
between  them. 

5.  A  miracle  may  be  supernatural,  or  above  nature,  without 
being  unnatural,  or  against  nature. 

6.  The  greatest  church  teachers  have  maintained  that  mir- 
acles were  not  against  law  or  without  law,  but  above  com- 
mon law.  Hahn,  after  mentioning  the  view  of  a  miracle  as 
a  suspension  of  law,  and  calling  it  one  neither  scriptural  nor 
conceivable,  proceeds  to  quote  Augustine  and  other  writers, 
who  held  that  miracles  were  by  no  means  opposed  to  law.* 

*  A  story  is  told  of  a  clock,  on  one  of  the  high  cathedral  towers  of  the  older 
world,  so  constructed  that  at  the  close  of  a  century  it  strikes  the  years  as  it 
ordinarily  strikes  the  hours.  As  a  hundred  years  come  to  a  close,  suddenly,  in 
the  immense  mass  of  complicated  mechanism,  a  little  wheel  turns,  a  pin  slides 
into  the  appointed  place,  and  in  the  shadows  of  the  night  the  bell  tolls  a  requi- 
em over  the  generations  which  during  a  century  have  lived,  and  labored,  and 
been  buried  around  it.  One  of  these  generations  might  live  and  die,  and  wit- 
ness nothing  peculiar.     The  clock  would  have  what  we  call  an  established 


MIRACLES.        •  65 

III.  The  Preternatural  View  of  Miracles. — This  view  ad- 
mits the  reality  of  the  phenomena,  but  explains  them  as  re- 
sulting from  mysterious  forces,  Avhich  are  neither  divine 
on  the  one  hand,  nor  human  on  the  other,  but  which  are 
outside  of  nature.  This  is  the  demoniacal  view,  or  that 
which  supposes  that  evil  spirits,  departed  souls,  or  spirits 
neither  good  nor  bad,  surround  the  earth,  and  can  be  reached 
by  magic,  witchcraft,  sorcery,  magnetism,  or  what  is  now 
called  Spiritualism.  This  theory  supposes  that  the  works 
of  Jesus  were  performed  by  the  aid  of  spiritual  beings.  The 
objections  to  this  view  are,  — 

1.  If  it  is  supposed,  as  it  was  by  the  Jews,  that  Jesus  had 
the  aid  of  evil  spirits,  the  sufficient  answer  is,  that  his  works 
were  good  works. 

2.  If  it  is  argued  that  he  performed  his  miracles  by  the 
aid  of  departed  spirits  who  were  good  spirits,  the  answer  is, 
that  he  himself  never  took  this  view,  but  always  declared, 
"  My  Father,  who  dwelleth  in  me,  he  doeth  the  works." 
Moreover,  the  whole  character  of  the  miracles  of  Jesus  dif- 
fers not  only  from  everything  ever  done  by  magnetism  or 
spiritualism,  but  from  everything  ever  claimed  to  be  done. 

IV.  The  Supernatural  View  of  Miracles.  —  This  view  as- 
serts that  the  miracles  A\ere  performed  by  higher  forces, 
which  came  into  this  world  from  a  higher  world  than  this. 
It  asserts  that  besides  the  forces  which  are  at  work  regularly 

order  of  its  own  ;  but  what  should  we  say  when,  at  the  midnight  which  brought 
the  century  to  a  close,  it  sounded  over  the  sleeping  city,  rousing  all  to  listen  to 
the  world's  age  ?  Would  it  be  a  violation  of  law  ?  No  ;  only  a  variation  of  the 
accustomed  order,  produced  by  the  intervention  of  a  force  always  existing,  but 
uever  appearing  in  this  way  till  the  appointed  moment  had  arrived.  The  toll- 
ing of  the  century  would  be  a  variation  from  the  observed  order  of  the  clock; 
but  to  an  artist,  in  constructing  it,  it  would  have  formed  a  part  of  that  order. 
So  a  miracle  is  a  variation  of  the  order  of  nature  as  it  has  appeared  to  us ;  but 
to  the  Author  of  nature  it  was  a  part  of  that  predestined  order  —  a  part  of  that 
order  of  which  he  is  at  all  times  the  immediate  Author  and  Sustaincr  ;  mirac- 
ulous to  us,  seen  from  our  human  point  of  view,  but  no  miracle  to  God  ;  to  our 
circumscribed  vision  a  violation  of  law,  but  to  God  only  a  part  in  the  great 
plan  and  progress  of  the  law  of  the  universe.  —  Ephrnim  Peabody. 
6* 


66     orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

in  the  world,  there  are  other  forces  outside  of  the  world, 
which  may  from  time  to  time  come  into  it.  We  call  them 
higher  forces  not  only  because  they  are  more  powerful  than 
the  forces  before  at  work  in  the  world,  by  overcoming  which 
they  produce  the  extraordinary  outward  phenomena,  but  be- 
cause they  always  tend  to  elevate  the  world  nearer  to  God. 
They  are  thus  proved  to  come  from  a  Avorld  which  is  nearer 
to  God  than  this.  The  reasons  in  support  of  this  view  are,  as 
before  suggested,  — 

1.  Geology  teaches  it.  The  rocks  show  not  only  an  origi- 
nal creation  of  the  world,  but  successive  creations  of  vegeta- 
ble  and  animal  life. 

2.  The  ci-eatiou  of  the  world  teaches  it.  Creation  was  a 
miracle  in  this  sense  of  the  word. 

3.  There  seems  to  be  in  the  constitution  of  man  a  faculty 
provided  for  recognizing  the  supernatural  element.  Phre- 
nologists call  it  the  organ  of  marvellousness.  Such  a  faculty 
would  argue  the  existence  of  an  appropriate  object  on  which 
it  might  be  exercised. 

4.  The  whole  life  and  character  of  Jesus  were  supernatural 
and  miraculous  in  this  sense.  They  cannot  be  satisfactorily 
explained  as  the  result  of  anything  existing  in  the  world 
before.  * 

§  4.  Criticism  on  these  Different  Vieivs  of  Miracles.  —  In 
attempting  to  discover  the  truths  and  errors  contained  in 
these  statements  it  is  a  great  satisfaction  to  feel  that  our 
faith  in  Christ  and  Christianity  is  not  depending  on  them. 
If  we  believed  with  those  who  consider  miracles  the  only  or 
the  principal  proof  of  Christianity,  we  could  hardly  hope  to 
be  candid  and  just  in  examining  the  arguments  of  those  Avho 
deny  the  marvellous  facts  of  the  New  Testament.  There  is 
no  doubt  that  the  number  of  religious  and  Christian  men 
who  have  relinquished  all  belief  in  the  marvellous  part  of 
the  Bible  has  largely  increased  within  a  few  years.  At  the 
present  time  there  is  a  strong  tendency  to  disbelieve  and 


MIRACLES.  67 

deny  all  miracles  as  incredible  and  impossible.  Renan,  ia 
his  "  Life  of  Jesus,"  says,  "  Miracles  never  happen  except 
among  people  disposed  to  believe  them.  We  banish  miracles 
from  history  in  the  name  of  a  constant  experience.  No 
miracle  has,  as  yet,  been  proved."  Renan  adds,  that  "  if  a 
commission  of  men  of  science  should  decide  that  a  man  had 
been  raised  from  the  dead  he  would  believe  it."  "  Till 
then,''  he  says,  "  it  is  the  duty  of  the  historian  not  to  admit 
a  supernatural  fact,  but  to  find,  if  he  can,  what  part  credulity 
and  imposition  have  had  in  it."  Accordingly,  Renan  writes 
his  "  Life  of  Jesus  "  in  this  sense,  discarding  most  of  the  mira- 
cles, or  explaining  them  away,  and  trying  to  put  together 
into  some  kind  of  shape  the  fragments  which  remain.  But 
Renan  does  not  go  far  enough  to  satisfy  some  others.  Ger- 
ritt  Smith,  for  example,  in  a  recent  lecture  which  he  has 
publislied,  called  "  Be  Natural,"  says,  "■  Jesus  neither  per- 
formed nor  attempted  to  perform  miracles.  His  wisdom  and 
sincerity  forbid  the  supposition.  Am  I  an  unbeliever  in  the 
historical  Jesus  because  I  hold  him  innocent  of  the  absurdi- 
ties which  superstition  and  folly  tax  him  with?  No  more 
than  I  should  disbelieve  in  Shakespeare,  by  denying  that 
he  walked  on  the  Avon,  or  changed  its  waters  into  wine. 
M.  Renan  ought  to  have  made  no  account  of  these  stories  of 
miracles.  He  should  have  dropped  them  entirely^  as  did 
Rammohun  Roy  in  his  Hindoo  translation  of  the  New  Tes- 
tament. Let  the  credulous  feed  on  these  creations  of  super- 
stition, but  let  men  of  sense  turn  away  from  them." 

The  reason  Avhy  so  many  intelligent  men  find  it  impossible 
to  believe  the  miracles  of  the  New  Testament,  while  they 
Gnd  it  very  easy  to  believe  the  religious  and  moral  teacliing 
of  Jesus  is  partly  due  to  the  spirit  of  the  age.  The  intellect 
of  this  age  is  more  and  more  scientific.  Now,  science  is  the 
knowledge  of  facts  and  laws.  A  miracle  is  opposed  to  all 
usual  observation  of  facts,  and  is  often  called  by  theologians 
a  violation  of  the  laws  of  nature.     It  is  not  therefore  strange 


68      ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

that  men  imbued  with  the  spirit  of  science  should  dislike  the 
notion  of  miracles. 

§  '5.  Miracles  no  Proof  of  Christianity.  —  Now,  we  should 
have  little  objection,  on  purely  theological  grounds,  to  give 
up  the  miracles  of  the  New  Testament.  Theologians  have 
built  up  the  proof  of  Christianity  on  miracles.  They  have 
declared  them  the  chief  evidence  of  Christianity.  They 
have  said,  "  A  miracle  is  a  violation  of  a  law  of  nature. 
Now,  no  one  but  God  can  violate  a  law  of  nature.  If  Jesus 
violated  a  law  of  nature,  it  proved  that  God  was  with  him. 
But  that  he  did  so  we  know  from  the  New  Testament. 
That  it  tells  the  truth  we  know,  because  it  was  written  by 
eye-witnesses,  who  could  not  have  been  mistaken,  because 
they  saw  the  miracles  with  their  own  eyes,  and  were  not 
liars,  because  they  laid  down  their  lives  in  testimony  of  the 
truth  of  what  they  asserted."  Therefore,  it  is  argued, 
"  Christ  worked  miracles  ;  therefore  he  had  God's  help  and 
power  ;  therefore  he  has  God's  authority  to  teach  the  religion 
of  the  New  Testament." 

Now,  for  those  who  hold  this  view  of  Christianity,  if 
they  renounce  miracles,  it  is  evident  that  the  foundation  of 
faith  is  gone.  No  wonder,  therefore,  that  they  bitterly 
oppose  all  attacks  on  miracles.  In  defending  miracles,  they 
are  fighting  for  their  lives. 

But  we  need  not  hold  this  view  of  the  foundation  of  Chris- 
tianity. Christianity  does  not  rest  necessarily  on  the  physi- 
cal miracles  of  Christ,  but  on  his  moral  miracles,  which  no 
one  has  ever  doubted,  or  can  doubt.  Christianity  proceeded 
from  Jesus,  and  was  transmitted  by  him,  not  as  a  philosophy, 
but  as  a  power,  a  life,  which  renewed  the  old  world,  and 
created  a  new  dispensation.  This  is  the  great  miracle.  We 
do  not  really  believe  Christianity  on  the  ground  of  miracles, 
but  we  believe  miracles  on  the  ground  of  Christianity. 

Let  us  explain  this.  If  miracles  had  been  asserted  to  be 
wrought  by  God  in  order  to  prove  the  truth  of  a  doctrine 


MIRACLES.  69 

irrational,  self-contradictory,  odious  to  the  conscience  and  to 
the  heart,  — to  prove,  for  example,  the  justice  of  the  Spanish 
Inquisition,  the  lawfulness  of  slavery,  or  that  God  loves 
some  of  his  children  and  hates  the  rest,  —  then  all  the  out- 
wai'd  evidence  in  the  world  would  not  have  convinced  us 
that  God  had  taught  such  a  doctrine  and  confirmed  it  by 
miracles.  If  we  had  seen  with  our  own  eyes  a  dead  man 
raised  to  life,  or  if  M.  Kenan's  committee  of  scientific  men 
had  testified  that  they  had  seen  it,  we  should  either  say  they 
wei'e  deceived,  or  we  should  say,  with  the  Jews,  "  It  is 
done  by  some  devilish  power,  not  by  a  divine  power.  It  is 
not  supernatural,  it  is  preternatural."  But  Christianity 
itself  is  the  great  miracle  of  human  history.  It  is  more 
marvellous  than  raising  a  dead  man,  for  it  was  the  resur- 
rectio7i  of  a  dead  world  —  of  a  dead  humanity.  Read  Gib- 
bon. He  is  an  infidel  wTiter,  but  he  is  a  perfect  historian. 
He  shows  you  Christianity,  as  a  living  force,  coming  into 
history,  pouring  a  tide  of  life  into  the  decaying  civilization  of 
Rome,  overflowing  upon  the  German  tribes,  and  changing  their 
whole  character,  so  as  to  make  out  of  those  savage  warriors 
merciful  and  reverential  soldiers,  who  knew  how  to  pardon  and 
how  to  spare.  Now,  there  seems  something  quite  as  super- 
natural in  this  as  in  the  coming  of  new  trees  and  plants  into 
the  world  in  the  carboniferous  epoch,  or  the  coming  in  of 
mammalia,  a  hundred  thousand  years  or  so  after.  It  seems 
as  if  God  came  near  the  world,  and  touched  it  in  Jesus 
Christ ;  for  the  power  of  one  man  was  wholly  inadequate 
to  such  results  as  followed  his  coming.  I  believe  Christianity 
a  divine  religion,  a  religion  from  God,  because  it  lifts  the 
Boul  nearer  to  God  —  because  it  has  lifted  mankind  nearer  to 
God,  and  enabled  men  to  believe  God  a  friend  —  not  a  tyrant, 
not  a  stern  king  —  but  a  father.  Christianity  is  divine, 
because  its  truth  and  love  are  divine  —  because  it  purifies, 
consoles,  and  elevates  human  hearts  ;  because  the  life  of  Jesus 
is,  by  the  testimony  of  such  men  as  Theodore  Parker,  Rous- 


70     orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

seau,  and  Renan,  infinitely  superior  to  all  other  lives  ever 
lived  in,  this  world.  Now,  believing  in  Christianity  and 
Christ  on  such  grounds,  Ave  may  look  with  much  more 
deference  and  respect  upon  the  stories  of  miracles  which  are 
intertwined  in  his  life.  We  should  not  attend  to  them  at  all 
if  we  found  them  told  about  only  common  men  ;  but  told 
about  Jesus,  we  are  led  to  examine  them  more  critically,  an^ 
ask  whether  it  is,  or  is  not,  possible  for  them  to  have  bee^e 
in  the  main,  real  facts.  iy 

The  Orthodox  doctrine  has  been,  and  still  is,  that  Chris- 
tianity rests  on  miracles.  Our  view  is,  that  miracles  rest  on 
Christianity.  But  we  close  this  section  with  extracts  from 
Luther,  Channing,  Trench,  and  Walker,  to  show  that  the 
view  for  which  we  contend  is  not  without  able  supporters  in 
all  parts  of  the  Church. 

Martin  Luther  says,  — 

"  People  cry  it  up  as  a  great  miracle,  that  Christ  made  the 
blind  see,  the  deaf  hear,  and  the  lepers  clean ;  and  it  is 
true  such  works  are  miraculous  signs  ;  but  Christ  regards  his 
influence  on  the  soul  as  far  more  important  than  that  on 
the  body ;  for  as  the  soul  excels  the  body,  so  do  the  mira- 
cles wrought  on  the  former  excel  those  wrought  on  the 
latter.     .     .     . 

"  The  miracles  which  Christ  wrought  on  the  body  are 
small  and  almost  childish,  compared  with  the  high  and  true 
miracles  which  he  constantly  performs  in  the  Christian 
world  by  his  divine,  almighty  power ;  for  instance,  that 
Christianity  is  preserved  on  the  earth  ;  that  the  word  of  God 
and  faith  in  him  can  yet  hold  out ;  yea,  that  a  Christian  can 
survive  on  earth  against  the  devil  and  all  his  angels  ;  also 
against  so  many  tyrants  and  factions  ;  yea,  against  our  own 
flesh  and  blood.  The  fact  that  the  gospel  remains  and 
improves  the  human  heart,  —  this  is  indeed  to  cast  out  the 
devil,  and  tread  on  serpents,  and  speak  with  tongues ;  for 
those  visible  miracles  were  merely  signs  for  the  ignorant, 


MIRACLES.  71 

unbelieving  crowd,  aud  for  tliosc  who  were  yet  to  be  brought 
in ;  but  for  us,  Avho  know  and  believe,  what  need  is  there 
of  them?  For  the  heathen,  indeed,  Christ  must  needs  give 
external  signs,  which  they  could  see  and  take  hold  of;  but 
Cliristians  must  needs  have  far  higher  signs,  compared  with 
vhich  the  former  are  earlhly.     It  was  necessary  to  bring 

er  the  ignorant  with  external  mii'acles,  and  to  throw  out 
tc'h  apples  and  pears  to  them  as  children  ;  but  we,  on  tho 
hitrary,  should  boast  of  the  great  miracles  which  Christ 
daily  performs  in  his  church." 

In  the  "Christian  Ex.aminer,"  Dr.  James  "Walker  says, — 

"  Christianity  embodies  a  collection  of  moral  and  vital 
truths,  aud  these  truths,  apart  from  all  history  or  philosophy, 
constitute  Christianity  itself.  Instead,  therefore,  of  perplex- 
ing and  confounding  the  young  with  what  are  called  the 
evidences  of  Christianity,  give  them  Christianity  itself.  Begin 
by  giving  them  Christianity  itself,  as  exhibited  in  the  life 
and  character  of  the  Lord  Jesus,  as  illustrated  by  his  simple, 
beautiful  aud  touching  parables,  and  as  it  breathes  through 
all  his  discourses.  They  will  feel  it  to  he  true.  Depend 
upon  it,  paradoxical  as  it  may  sound,  children  will  be  much 
more  likely  to  believe  Christianity  w^ithout  what  are  called 
the  evidences,  than  with  them ;  and  the  remark  applies  to 
some  who  are  not  children. 

"  Why  talk  to  one  about  the  argument  from  prophecy,  or  the 
argument  from  miracles,  when  these  are  the  very  points,  and 
the  only  points,  on  which  his  mind,  from  some  peculiarity  in  its 
original  constitution,  or  from  limited  intormation,  chiefly  la- 
bors. Give  him  Christianity  itself,  by  which  we  mean  the 
body  of  moral  and  vital  truths  which  constitute  Christianity. 
Observe  it  when  you  Avill,  you  will  find  that  the  doubts  and  dif- 
ficulties suggested  by  children  relate  almost  exclusively  to  the 
history  of  Christianity,  or  to  what  are  called  the  external  evi- 
dences of  Christianity,  and  not  to  the  truth  of  Christianity  itself. 
Give  them^Chriatianity  itself;  for  if  they  believe  in  that,  it 


72  orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

is  enough.  Nothing  can  be  more  injudicious  than  to  persist 
in  urging  the  argument  from  miracles  on  a  mind,  that,  from 
any  cause,  has  thus  become  indifferent,  and  perhaps  impa- 
tient of  it.  How  idle  to  think  to  convince  a  person  of  Chris- 
tianity by  miracles,  when  it  is  these  very  miracles,  and  not 
Christianity,  that  he  doubts  !  The  instances,  we  suspect,  are' 
not  rare,  even  of  adults,  who  are  fast  converted  to  Christianity 
itself,  and  afterwards,  through  the  moral  and  spiritual  chang^e 
which  Christianity  induces,  are  brought  to  believe  entirely 
and  devoutly  in  its  miraculous  origin  and  history." 

Dr.  Channing  says,  — 

"  There  is  another  evidence  of  Christianity  still  more  inter- 
nal than  any  on  which  I  have  yet  dwelt ;  an  evidence  to  be 
felt  rather  than  described,  but  not  less  real  because  founded 
on  feeling.  I  refer  to  that  conviction  of  the  divine  original 
of  our  religion  which  springs  up  and  continually  gains  strength 
in  those  who  apply  it  habitually  to  their  tempers  and  lives, 
and  who  imbibe  its  spirit  and  hopes.  In  such  men  there  is 
a  consciousness  of  the  adaptation  of  Christianity  to  their 
noblest  faculties  ;  a  consciousness  of  its  exalting  and  consol- 
ing influences,  of  its  power  to  confer  the  true  happiness  of 
human  nature,  to  give  that  peace  which  the  world  cannot 
give  ;  which  assures  them  that  it  is  not  of  earthly  origin,  but 
'  a  ray  from  the  everlasting  Light,  a  stream  from  the  fountain 
of  heavenly  Wisdom  and  Love.  This  is  the  evidence  which 
sustains  the  faith  of  thousands,  who  never  read  and  cannot 
understand  the  learned  books  of  Christian  apologists,  who 
want,  perhaps,  words  to  explain  the  ground  of  their  belief, 
but  whose  faith  is  of  adamantine  firmness,  who  hold  the 
gospel  with  a  conviction  more  intimate  and  unwavering  than 
mere  arguments  ever  produced." 

And  here  is  an  extract  from  another  writer  :  — 

"  Doubtless  Christ's  spiritual  glory  is  in  itself  as  distin- 
guishing, and  as  plainly  showing  his  divinity,  as  his  out- 
ward glory,  and  a  great  deal  more  ;  for  his  spiritual  glory 


MIRACLES.  73 

is  that  wherein  his  divinity  consists,  and  the  outward  glory 
of  his  transfiguration  showed  him  to  be  divine  only  as 
it  was  a  remarkable  image  or  representation  of  that  spir- 
itual glory.  Doubtless,  therefore,  he  that  has  had  a  clear 
sight  of  tlie  spiritual  glory  of  Christ  may  say,  '  I  have  not 
followed  cunningly  devised  fables,  but  have  been  an  eye- 
witness of  his  majesty,'  upon  as  good  grounds  as  the  apos- 
tle, when  he  had  respect  to  the  outward  glory  of  Christ  that 
he  had  seen.  A  true  sense  of  the  divine  excellency  of  the 
things  of  God's  Word  doth  more  directly  and  immediately 
convince  of  the  truth  of  them ;  and  that  because  the  ex- 
cellency of  these  things  is  so  superlative.  There  is  a 
beauty  in  them  that  is  so  divine  and  godlike,  that  is  greatly 
and  evidently  distinguishing  of  them  from  things  merely  hu- 
man, or  that  men  are  the  authors  and  inventors  of,  —  a  glory 
that  is  so  high  and  great,  that  when  clearly  seen,  commands 
assent  to  their  divinity  and  reality.  The  evidence  which 
they  who  are  spiritually  enlightened  have  of  the  truth  of  the 
things  of  religion,  is  a  kind  of  intuition  and  immediate  evi- 
dence. They  believe  the  doctrines  of  God's  Word  to  be 
divine,  because  they  see  divinity  in  them.  That  is,  they  see 
a  divine,  and  transcendent,  and  most  evidently  distinguish- 
ing glory  in  them ;  such  a  glory  as,  if  clearly  seen,  does 
not  leave  room  to  doubt  of  their  being  of  God,  and  not  of 
men." 

Trench,  also,  denies  that  the  miracle  can  have  absolute 
authority,  since  Satanic  powers  may  work  evil  too.  This 
convinces  us,  he  says,  that  miracles  cannot  be  appealed  to  in 
proof  of  the  doctrine  or  of  the  divine  mission  of  him  who 
brings  it  to  pass.  The  doctrine  must  first  commend  itself  to 
the  conscience  as  being  good ;  then  tlie  miracle  shows  it  to 
be  a  new  word  from  God.  But  when  the  mind  and  con 
science  reject  the  doctrine,  the  miracle  must  be  rejected  too. 
The  great  act  of  faith  is  to  believe,  in  despite  of  all  miracles, 
what  God  has  revealed  to  the  soul  of  the  holy  and  the  true  ; 
7 


74      ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

not  to  believe  another  gospel,  though  an  angel  from  heaven 
should  bring  it.  Instead  of  compelling  assent,  miracles  are 
then  rather  warnings  to  us  that  we  keep  aloof;  for  they 
tell  us  not  merely  that  lies  are  here,  but  that  he  who  utters 
them  is  an  instrument  of  Satan. 

False  miracles,  or  lying  wonders,  are  distinguished  from 
the  true,  not  by  the  intellect,  but  by  the  moral  sense,  which 
finds  in  them  something  immoral,  or  ostentatious,  or  futile, 
leading  to  nothing.  Origen  says  the  miracles  of  Moses 
issued  in  a  Jewish  polity  ;  those  of  our  Lord  in  a  Christian 
Church.  But  what  fruits  have  the  miracles  of  Apollonius 
or  ^sculapius  to  show  ? 

The  miracles  of  Christ  are  redemptive.  Modern  writers 
of  evidences  make  a  dangerous  omission  when  they  fail  to 
say  that  the  doctrine  is  to  try  the  miracle,  as  well  as  the 
miracle  to  seal  the  doctrine.  To  teach  men  to  believe  in 
Christ  on  no  other  grounds  than  his  wonderful  works  is  to 
pave  the  way  of  Antichrist.  Those  books  of  Christian 
evidences  are  utterly  maimed  and  imperfect,  fraught  with 
the  most  perilous  consequences,  which  reverence  in  the 
miracle  only  its  power.* 

§  6.  But  Orthodoxy  is  rigid  in  maintaining  their  Reality  as 
Historic  Facts.  —  The  first  thing  we  notice  about  the  mira- 
cles of  Jesus  is,  that  they  are  intertwined  inextricably  with 
the  whole  narrative.  It  is  almost  impossible  to  disentangle 
them,  and  to  leave  any  solid  historic  residuum.  There  is  a 
story  in  Goethe  of  a  statue  of  iron  and  silver,  with  veins  of 
gold.  The  flames  licked  out  the  gold  veins  of  the  colossus, 
and  it  remained  standing  a  little  while  ;  but  when  at  last  the 
tenderest  filaments  had  been  licked  out,  the  image  crashed 
together,  and  fell  in  a  shapeless,  miserable  heap.  So  when 
the  tongue  of  criticism  shall  have  eaten  out  the  supernatural 
elements  of  the  gospel  narrative,  the  heroic  figure  will  fall, 

*  Trench,  **  Notes  on  the  Miracles  of  our  Lord," 


MIRACLES.  75 

as  it  has  already  in  Renan's  construction,  into  an  amorphous 
mass  of  unhistoric  rubbish. 

Then  we  see  that  most  of  these  miracles  are  miracles  of 
healing,  which  have  their  analogues  in  many  similar  events 
scattei'cd  through  history.  Many  such  facts  might  be  col- 
lected to  show  that  there  is  in  man  a  latent  power  of  over- 
coming disease,  in  himself  and  others,  by  a  great  exertion  of 
will.  If  in  common  men  there  is  such  a  power,  latent,  and 
as  yet  undeveloped,  why  should  it  be  an  unnatural  thing  that 
one  so  full  of  a  superhuman  life  as  Jesus  should  be  raised  to 
a  position  where,  by  his  very  word  or  touch,  he  could  cure 
disease,  and  that  even  at  a  distance? 

We  see  such  wonderful  discoveries  made  every  day  of 
latent  powers  in  nature,  and  secrets  hidden  till  now  from  all 
men,  that  we  do  not  know  whei'e  to  put  limits  to  the  possi- 
bility of  the  wonderful.  To  go  into  a  telegraphic  office  in 
Boston,  and  speak  to  a  man  in  New  York  or  Washington, 
and  have  an  answer  in  five  miuutes  ;  to  have  your  portrait 
painted  in  a  moment  by  the  rays  of  the  sun,  —  such  things 
as  these  would  have  seemed  miracles  to  us  a  few  years  ago. 
To  be  able  to  tell  what  metals  there  are  in  the  sun's  atmos- 
phere, and  what  not  there ;  to  say,  "  In  the  atmosphere  of 
the  sun  there  is  silver,  but  not  gold  ;  there  are  iron,  and  anti- 
mony, and  lead,  and  aluminum,  but  no  copper  nor  zinc,"  — 
does  not  this  seem  incredible?  But  we  know  that  we  can 
now  tell  just  that. 

When  we  read  the  Gospels,  we  find  everything  in  them  so 
simple,  so  unpretending,  so  little  of  an  attempt  at  making 
out  a  consistent  story,  such  a  harmony  in  the  character  of 
the  works  attributed  to  Jesus  (with  one  or  two  exceptions), 
that  we  are  irresistibly  inclined  to  say,  "  These  stories  must  be 
simple  facts.  Delusion  never  spoke  in  this  tone,  —  so  clear, 
so  luminous,  —  in  language  so  honest  and  sincere." 

I  do  not  deny  that  some  mistakes  or  misapprehensions  may 
have  crept  into  the  records.     Occasionally  we  can  see  signs 


76      ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERR0E3. 

of  something  being  mistaken  for  a  miracle  which  was  really 
not  one.  For  example,  the  finding  of  a  piece  of  money  iu 
the  fish's  mouth  may  have  been  the  mistake  of  a  proverbial 
expression,  common  among  fishermen,  and  used  by  Matthew 
iu  his  original  Hebrew  Gospel,  but  which  the  Greek  trans- 
lator, ignorant  of  the  popular  phrase,  considered  to  be  meant 
for  a  miracle. 

The  most  natural  supposition  is,  that  a  wonderful  power 
dwelt  in  Jesus,  which  enabled  him  to  heal  the  sick,  cure  the 
insane,  and  sometimes  even  bring  back  life  to  the  dead. 
What  do  we  know  about  death  ?  The  last  breath  has  been 
drawn.  The  heart  has  ceased  to  beat,  the  lungs  to  move. 
We  say,  "  He  is  dead."  But  people  have  lain  two  or  three 
days  in  this  state,  declared  dead  by  the  physicians,  and  then 
have  come  to  life  again  by  natural  causes.  A  drowned  man 
has  all  the  marks  of  death  ;  but  after  lying  in  this  state  half 
an  hour,  he  is  brought  to  life  again.  What,  then,  might  not 
have  been  done  by  that  supernatural  power  of  life  which,  as 
history  shows,  dwelt  iu  Jesus  of  Nazareth? 

§  7.  Analogy  with  other  Similar  Events  recorded  in  His- 
tory.—  It  may  very  properly  be  asked  whether  miracles 
have  occurred  since  the  Bible  record  was  closed  ;  and  if  not, 
why  not.  Since  we  have  regarded  the  miracles  of  the  New 
Testament  as  no  violations  of  law,  but  the  coming  in  of 
higher  laws  or  forces  than  those  usually  at  work  in  the 
world,  why  ma^  they  not  have  taken  place  in  our  own  time  ? 
If  Christ's  miracles  differ  only  from  other  miracles  in  being 
higher  and  more  perfect,  what  are  the  miracles  of  a  lower 
class  ?  Can  we  point  out  any  events  belonging  to  the  same 
class  of  phenomena  which  have  happened  during  the  last 
thousand  years  ? 

In  reply  to  this  question,  we  will  proceed  to  mention  cer- 
tain phenomena  which  seem  to  belong  to  the  same  oi'der  aa 
the  works  of  Jesus.  The  distinction  between  the  miracles  of 
Christ  and  all  those  portents  will  be  pointed  out  hereafter. 


MIRACLES.  77 

In  the  "  Atlantic  Monthly "  for  February  and  March, 
1864,  there  appeared  an  account  (written,  we  believe,  by 
R.  Dale  Owen),  of  the  Convulsionists  of  St.  Medard.  The 
facts  therein  stated  seem  to  contradict  all  the  known  laws  of 
physiology.  The  lower  side  of  miracles,  namely,  their  ap- 
parent violation  of  physical  laws,  here  appears  as  fully 
developed  and  as  fully  attested  as  the  most  careful  sceptic 
could  desire.  If,  therefore,  any  one  objects  to  believing  the 
miracles  of  Jesus  on  the  ground  that  they  seem  to  be  viola- 
tions of  physical  laws,  we  ask  what  they  mean  to  do  Avith 
these  facts,  so  extraordinary,  and  yet  so  fully  attested.  If 
believed,  there  is  no  reason,  based  on  the  abnormal  charac- 
ter of  Christ's  works,  for  rejecting  those.  But  if  disbelieved, 
it  can  be  done  only  by  setting  aside  all  the  ordinary  rules  of 
evidence,  and  all  the  laws  of  belief,  in  favor  of  a  negative 
prepossession  of  a  purely  empirical  character.  Phenomena 
somewhat  similar  to  these  have  occurred  elsewhere,  among 
Protestants  as  well  as  Catholics,  during  periods  of  great 
religious  excitement.  The  beginnings  of  most  religious  sys- 
tems—  Methodism,  Quakerism,  &c.  —  have  stories  like  these 
of  supernatural  influences.  They  have  usually  been  disbe- 
lieved because  their  friends  have  claimed  too  much  :  they 
have  claimed  that  such  phenomena  were  divine  attestations 
to  the  truth  of  the  doctrine  preached.  What  is. proved  by 
them  is  the  simple  fact  that  the  soul  of  man  is  capable, 
under  high  excitement,  of  suspending,  or  rather  overcoming, 
all  common  physiological  laws.  We  have  seen  similar  re- 
sults follow  often  from  such  causes,  only  in  ordinary  ways. 
A  sick  person  is  made  well  in  a  moment  by  some  moral 
influence  ;  a  weak  and  sickly  mother  will  nurse  a  sick  child, 
night  after  night,  without  rest  or  sleep,  and  keep  Avell,  where 
a  strong  man  would  break  down.  Mesmerism  brings  for- 
ward multitudes  of  like  facts.  There  are,  for  example,  the 
well-attested  facts  concerning  the  transfer  of  the  senses  :  that 
people  under  the  influence  of  animal  magnetism  can  read 
7* 


78  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

with  their  forehead,  the  pit  of  their  stomach,  or  the  back  of 
their  head.  We  have  seen  a  weak  boy,  some  thirteen  years 
old,  when  magnetized,  lift  a  chair  with  three  heavy  men 
standing  on  it.  Clairvoyance,  or  seeing  things  at  a  distance, 
though  not  so  well  proved,  is  confirmed  by  a  vast  number  of 
facts.  We  come,  then,  to  our  final  statement  concerning 
miracles,  which  is  this  :  — 

I.  There  is  in  man  a  power,  as  yet  undeveloped,  and  only 
occasionally  seen  in  exceptional  conditions,  of  overcoming 
the  common  laws  of  nature  by  force  of  will ;  and  this  is 
sometimes  voluntary,  and  sometimes  involuntary. 

II.  This  phenomenon  takes  these  forms  :  — 

A.  Foiver  of  the  soul  over  the  body  (a.)  to  resist  pain,  as 
in  the  case  of  martyrs,  who  are  burned  alive  without  any 
appearance  of  suffering;  (/>.)  to  resist  physical  injury,  as  in 
the  case  of  the  Convulsionists  ;  (c.)  to  dispense  with  the  usual 
service  of  the  senses,  as  in  the  case  of  the  girl  at  Worcester 
Insane  Asylum,  Massachusetts,  under  the  care  of  Dr.  Wood- 
ward," who  could  read  a  book  in  a  perfectly  dark  room  and 
with  bandaged  eyes  ;  (cZ.)  to  give  a  preternatural  energy  and 
strength  to  the  body. 

B.  Preternatural  knowledge  —  such  cases  as  that  narrated 
by  Dr.  Bushnell,  of  Yonnt,  in  California ;  or  hnotvledge 
through  dreams,  waking  presentiments  ;  cases  o^  foresight,  or 
prophecy ;  of  insight,  or  knowledge  of  what  is  passing  in 
other  minds  ;  of  clairvoyance,  or  knowledge  of  what  is  hap- 
pening at  a  distance,  of  which  multitudes  of  facts  are  nar- 
rated in  such  books  as  the  "  Seeress  of  Provorst,"  Mi's.  Crowe's 
"  Night  Side  of  Nature,"  Robert  Dale  Owen's  "  Footfalls 
from  the  Boundary  of  the  Unseen  World,"  which,  after 
being  sifted  by  a  fair  criticism,  will  leave  a  large  residuum 
of  irresolvable  facts. 

C.  Higher  than  these  is  a  preternatural  elevation  of  the 
whole  character,  as  in  such  cases  as  that  of  Joan  of  Akc, 
where  a  young  girl,  ignorant,  a  peasant,  destitute  of  all  com- 


MIRACLES.  79 

mon  menus  of  influencing  any  one,  by  the  simple  power  of 
faith,  because  she  believed  herself  inspired  and  commis- 
sioned, succeeded  in  gaining  the  command  of  the  armies  of 
France,  and  then  of  achieving  a  series  of  victories,  equal,  on 
the  whole,  as  mere  military  exploits,  to  those  of  the  first 
captains  of  the  world. 

In  all  these  cases  we  see  manifestations  of  a  power  in  the 
soul  over  nature,  body,  men,  and  the  laws  of  time  and  space. 
So  we  say,  secondly,  — 

III.  This  power  was  possessed  in  the  highest  degree 
knoAvn  in  this  world  by  Jesus  of  Nazareth,  and  it  differed  in 
him  from  these  other  cases  in  these  points :  — 

1.  It  was  always  voluntary  in  its  exercise,  never  involun- 
tary. He  was  not  possessed  by  it,  he  possessed  it.  He  used 
it  just  when  and  where  he  chose  to  use  it.  It  was  always  at 
his  command  ;  he  never  appears  to  have  tried  to  work  a 
miracle,  and  failed.     So,  — 

2.  It  was  in  him  constant,  and  not  occasional.  In  other 
cases  where  the  miraculous  element  appears,  it  seems  to 
come  and  go  ;  but  to  Jesus  the  spirit  was  not  given  by 
measure.     He  had  it  always. 

3.  This  power  in  him  was  total,  and  not  partial.  It  was 
therefore  harmonious  —  in  harmony  with  all  his  other  quali- 
ties. He  had  power  over  diseases  of  the  body,  and  also 
those  of  the  soul.  He  knew  what  was  in  man,  and  what 
was  in  nature  —  in  the  present,  and  in  the  future.  There 
was  nothing  ecstatic,  enthusiastic,  nothing  of  excitement, 
about  him  ;  but  everything  denoted  a  fulness,  a  pleroma,  of 
this  spiritual  life. 

4.  The  exercise  of  this  power  in  Christ  was  always  emi- 
nently moral,  never  wilful.  The  one  or  two  seeming  excep- 
tions, as,  for  example,  the  cursing  the  fig  tree,  and  the 
causing  the  evil  spirits  to  go  into  the  swine,  ought  to  be 
explained  in  harmony  with  the  vast  majority  of  his  actions, 


80  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

which  always  are  guided  by  love,  and  justice,  and  a  holy 
sense  of  what  is  true  and  good. 

5thly,  and  lastly.  The  miracle  power  of  Jesus  reached  a 
higher  point  of  development  than  in  any  one  else.  The 
raising  of  the  dead  to  life,  and  the  mysterious  power  over 
nature  indicated  by  the  turning  of  water  into  wine,  by 
the  miracle  of  the  loaves  and  fishes,  calming  the  storm,  if 
facts,  are  facts  unparalleled  in  any  other  biography,  but 
seem  possible,  however  unintelligible,  when  considered  as 
emanating  from  such  a  masterly  and  commanding  spirit  as 
that  of  Jesus. 

And  this  finally  brings  us  to  the  miracle  of  the  resurrec- 
tion, concerning  which  we  will  first  quote  from  an  article  in 
a  late  number  of  the  "  Westminster  Review,"  to  show  the 
most  recent  ideas  of  the  critical  and  negative  school  on  this 
point. 

§  8.  Miracle  of  the  Resurrection.  Sceptical  Objections.  — 
In  an  article  in  the  "  Westminster  Review,"  in  "  The  Life  of 
Christ,  by  Strauss,"  occurs  the  following  passage  :  — 

"  For  of  the  two  alternatives  open  to  free  inquiry,  that  if 
Jesus  died  he  never  reappeared,  or  if  he  reappeared  he  never 
died,  Strauss  considers  the  former  not  only  preferable,  but 
the  only  tenable  one  ;  for  he  cannot  persuade  himself  that  a 
feeble  sufferer,  who  at  first  had  scarcely  strength  to  leave 
the  tomb,  and  in  the  end  succumbed  to  death,  could  have 
contrived  to  inspire  his  followers  with  the  conviction  that  he 
was  the  Prince  of  life,  the  Conqueror  of  the  gi-ave.  Strauss 
thus  admits  that  faith  in  the  supernatural  revival  of  the 
buried  Nazarene  was  undoubtedly  the  profession  of  the 
Christian  Church,  the  unconditional  antecedent  without 
which  Christianity  could  have  had  no  existence.  If,  then, 
we  refuse  to  assume  the  resurrection  to  be  an  historical  fact, 
we  have  to  explain  the  origin  of  the  Church's  btjlief  in  it. 
The  solution  which  satisfies  Strauss,  and  which  seems  to  u^s 
also  an  adequate  interpretation  of  the  problem,  is  dopendent 


MIRACLES.  81 

on  the  two  following  positions  :  1.  The  appearance  of  Jesus 
was  literally  an  appearance,  an  hallucination,  a  psychological 
phenomenon.  2.  It  was  also  a  sort  of  practical  fallacy  of 
confusion,  a  case  of  mistaken  identity. 

'•  But  it  will  be  said  that  this  natural  solution  of  the  prob- 
lem implies  a  foregone  conclusion  —  the  rejection  of  the  Or- 
thodox or  supernatural  solution.  Of  course  it  does ;  and 
accordingly  Strauss  has  been  accused  of  dogmatical  or  un- 
philosophical  assumption.  But  the  rejection  of  the  theologi- 
cal solution  is  not  the  result  of  ignorant  prejudice,  but  of 
enlightened  investigation.  Anti-supernaturalism  is  the  final 
irreversible  sentence  of  scientific  philosophy,  and  the  real 
dogmatist  and  hypothesis-maker  is  the  theologian.  That  the 
world  is  governed  by  uniform  laws  is  the  first  article  in  the 
creed  of  science,  and  to  disbelieve  whatever  is  at  variance 
with  those  uniform  laws,  whatever  contradicts  a  complete 
induction,  is  an  imperative,  intellectual  duty.  A  particular 
miracle  is  credible  to  him  alone  Avho  already  believes  in  su- 
pernatural agency.  Its  credibility  rests  on  an  assumption  — 
the  existence  of  such  agency.  But  our  most  comprehensive 
scientific  experience  has  detected  no  such  agency.  There  is 
no  miracle  in  nature  ;  there  is  no  evidence  of  any  miracle- 
working  energy  in  nature  ;  there  is  no  fact  in  nature  to  jus- 
tify the  expectation  of  miracle.  Rightly  has  it  been  said  by 
an  English  savant  and  divine,  that  testimony  is  a  second-hand 
assurance,  a  blind  guide,  that  can  avail  nothing  against  rea- 
son ;  and  that  to  have  any  evidence  of  a  Deity  working 
miracles,  we  must  go  out  of  nature  and  beyond  reason. 

"  Strauss's  prepossession,  therefore,  is  justifiable.  It  is  the 
prepossession  of  the  rational  theist,  who  does  not  believe  in 
a  God  who  changes  his  mind  and  improves  with  practice  — ■ 
the  prentice  maker  of  the  world ;  it  is  the  prepossession  of 
the  pantheist,  in  whose  theory  of  the  perfect  government  of 
an  immanent  God,  miracle  is  an  extravagance  and  absurdity  ; 
it  is  the  prepossession  of  the  philosophical  naturalist,  whose 


82  orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

experience  of  the  operations  of  nature  recognizes  no  extra- 
mundane  interventionalism." 

We  have  quoted  this  passage  as  containing  the  most  dis- 
tinct statement  of  an  extreme  anti-supernaturalism.  Ad- 
mitting the  death  of  Jesus  as  a  fact,  it  denies  his  resurrection 
as  a  fact,  and  that  on  doctrinal  and  theoretic  grounds.  De- 
claring anti-supernaturalism  to  be  the  final  irreversible  sen- 
tence of  scientific  philosophy,  it  assumes  supernaturalism  to 
be  a  denial  that  the  world  is  governed  by  uniform  laws.  It 
assumes  the  resurrection  of  Christ  to  be  at  variance  with 
those  uniform  laws.  It  denies  the  existence  of  any  super- 
natural agency  in  the  affairs  of  this  world.  It  denies  that 
there  ever  has  been  a  miracle  in  nature,  or  any  extra-mun- 
dane intervention  in  the  history  of  nature  or  man. 

This  is  what  claims  to  be  science,  at  the  present  time. 
We  deny  that  it  is  science,  and  assert  it  to  be  pure  dogma- 
tism and  theory,  contradicted  by  numerous  facts.  It  is  pure 
theory  to  assume  the  resurrection  of  Jesus  to  be  a  violation 
of  law.  It  is  pure  theoi'y  to  define  a  miracle  to  be  something 
opposed  to  law.  It  is  pure  theory  to  assume  that  the  mirac- 
ulous facts  ascribed  to  Jesus  in  the  Gospels  must  have  been, 
if  .they  occurred,  violations  of  law.  It  is  an  assumption, 
contradicted  by  geology,  that  there  is  nothing  in  the  experi- 
ence of  the  naturalist  of  the  operations  of  nature  to  show  any 
extra-mundane  intervention. 

We  have  admitted,  indeed,  that  these  same  assumptions 
have  been  made  by  Orthodox  theology.  Orthodox  theolo- 
gians have  also  assumed  the  miracles  of  Christ  to  be 
violations  of  the  laws  of  nature.  But  some  of  the  most  dis- 
tinguished theologians,  in  all  ages  of  the  Church,  have  not 
so  defined  them.  And  there  is  no  reason  why  the  man  of 
science  should  deny  the  possibility  of  a  fact  because  an  un- 
scientific explanation  has  been  given  of  that  fact  by  others. 
This  writer  virtually  says,  "  I  will  not  believe  that  Christ 
appeared  after  his  death,  on  any  amount  of  testimony,  be- 


MIRACLES.  83 

cause  some  persons  have  defined  such  appearances  as  being 
opposed  to  the  laws  of  nature."  It  is  certainly  true  that  we 
cannot  fully  believe  in  the  reality  of  any  phenomenon  which 
seems  to  us  to  be  a  violation  of  law.  It  is  also  true  that  the 
reported  facts  concerning  the  appearances  of  Jesus  seem  like 
a  violation  of  law.  But  the  scientific  course  is  neither 
to  deny  the  facts,  nor  to  explain  them  away,  but  to  study 
them,  in  order  to  see  whether,  after  all,  they  may  not  lead 
us  to  some  new  laws,  before  unknown. 

The  resurrection  of  Jesus  deserves  this  study,  since,  ac- 
cording to  the  confession  of  science  itself,  the  Christian 
Church  rests  upon  that  belief.  Strauss  admits  that  Chris- 
tianity could  not  have  existed  without  it.  But,  hastily  assum- 
ing that  the  real  appearance  of  Jesus  himself  would  be  a 
violation  of  a  law  of  nature,  he  supposes  this  immense  fact 
of  Christendom  to  rest  on  an  hallucination  and  a  case  of 
mistaken  identity. 

But  perhaps,  after  all,  the  resurrection  may  have  been  an 
example  of  a  universal  law.  Like  other  miracles,  which  are 
sporadic  instances,  in  this  world,  of  laws  which  may  be  the 
nature  of  other  worlds,  so  the  resurrection  may  have  been 
as  natural  an  event  as  any  other  in  the  life  of  Jesus.  Per- 
haps it  is  a  law  of  nature  that  all  souls  shall  become  disen- 
gaged from  the  earthly  body  on  the  third  day. after  death. 
Perhaps  they  all  rise  in  a  spiritual  body,  substantial  and 
real,  but  not  usually  perceptible  by  the  senses.  Perhaps,  in 
the  case  of  Jesus,  that  same  superior  command  of  miracu- 
lous force,  which  appeared  during  his  life,  enabled  him  to 
show  himself  easily  and  freely  whenever  he  would.  What 
became  of  the  earthly  body  we  do  not  know ;  it  may  have 
been  removed  by  the  priests  or  soldiers  to  prevent  the  disci- 
ples from  getting  possession  of  it.  The  body  in  which 
Christ  appeared  differed  evidently  from  the  earthly  body  in 
various  ways.  It  came  and  went  mysteriously ;  it  was 
8ometimes  I'ecognized,  and  sometimes  not  ;  and  it  ascended 


84       ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

into  the  spiritual  world  instead  of  passing  again  to  death 
and  the  grave.  Perhaps,  therefore,  it  may  be  a  universal 
law  that  souls  rise  out  of  the  material  body  into  a  higher 
state,  clothed  in  another  body,  substantial  and  real,  but  not 
material.  The  essence  of  the  resuri-ection  is  this  :  Resurrec- 
tion is  not  coming  to  life  again  with  the  same  body,  but 
ascent  into  a  higher  life  with  a  new  body. 

It  may  be  said  that  all  this  is  only  &  perhajjs.  Very  well ; 
it  is  only  a  perhaps,  but  that  is  all  we  want  in  order  to  refute 
the  logic  of  the  article  just  quoted.  The  scientific  sceptic 
says,  "  I  will  not  believe  that  Jesus  was  really  seen  after 
death,  because  that  would  be  a  violation  of  a  law  of  nature." 
We  reply,  "  No,  not  necessarily.  It  might  perhaps  have 
been  thus  and  so."  That  will  do  ;  for  if  we  can  show  that 
it  is  not  necessarily  a  violation  of  a  law  of  nature,  we  wholly 
remove  the  objection. 

But  we  may  go  farther,  and  assert  that  such  a  supposition 
as  we  have  made  not  only  accords  with  the  story  in  the 
Gospels,  but  also  with  the  whole  spirit  of  Christianity,  and 
with  all  the  analogies  of  nature.  The  resurrection  of  Jesus, 
so  regarded,  becomes  the  most  natural  thing  in  the  world. 
If  souls  live  after  death,  as  even  natural  instinct  teaches, 
they  live  somewhere.  As  by  the  analogy  of  nature  we  see 
an  ascending  scale  of  bodily  existence  up  to  man,  whose 
body  is  superior  to  that  of  all  other  animals,  because  fitted 
for  the  very  highest  uses,  so  if  man  is  to  live  hereafter  and 
elsewhere,  and  not  in  this  earthly  body,  analogy  would  an- 
ticipate that  he  should  live  in  a  body  still,  but  in  a  higher 
form.  If  Jesus,  therefore,  rose  in  this  higher  body,  and 
appeared  to  his  disciples,  it  was  to  lift  them  above  fear  of 
death  by  showing  that  this  corruptible  must  put  on  incorrup- 
tion.  So  his  resurrection  was  not  merely  coming  to  life 
again  in  the  same  body,  but  rising  up  into  a  higher  body  and 
a  higher  state,  to  show  us  how  we  are  to  be,  to  give  us  a 


MIRACLES.  85 

glimpse  of  the  hereafter,  to  bridge  over  the  gulf  between  this 
life  aud  that  to  come. 

§  9.  Final  JResult  of  this  Examination.  —  We  have  thus 
examined,  as  thoroughly  as  our  limited  space  will  allow,  the 
questions  at  issue,  on  the  subject  of  miracles,  between  the 
old  Orthodox  and  recent  heterodox  views  ;  and  the  result  to 
which  we  have  arrived  may  be  thus  stated :  — 

1.  We  may  believe,  on  the  testimony  of  history,  that 
through  Jesus  of  Nazareth  there  entered  the  world  a  great 
impulse  of  creative  moral  life,  which  has  been,  and  is  now, 
renewing  society.  This  new  impulse  of  life  may  be  regarded 
as  miraculous  or  supernatural. 

2.  We  may  believe,  though  perhaps  less  strongly,  but  still 
decidedly,  that  during  the  stay  of  Jesus  on  earth  many 
extraordinary  phenomena  took  place,  such  as  the  sudden 
healing  of  the  sick,  the  raising  of  the  dead  to  life,  a  display 
of  miraculous  insight  and  foresight,  or  knowledge  of  the 
present  and  the  future,  and  some  influence  over  organic  and 
material  life,  and  over  the  lifeless  forces  of  nature.  The 
precise  limits  of  this  we  do  not  know,  and  need  not  pretend 
to  define.  We  need  not  think  it  essential  to  fix  the  boun- 
dary. It  may  be  interesting  as  speculation,  but  it  is  not 
important  as  religion. 

3.  For,  in  the  third  place,  we  may  say  that  these  mira- 
cles of  Jesus  have  very  little  direct  bearing  on  our  religion. 
As  they  illustrate  his  character,  they  are  valuable,  and  also 
as  they  help  us  to  believe  that  the  laws  of  nature  are  not 
stifi"  and  rigid,  like  the  movement  of  a  machine,  but  that 
there  is  force  above  force,  a  vortex  of  living  powers,  in  the 
universe,  rising  higher  and  higher  towards  the  fountain  of 
all  force  and  life  in  God.  All  portents  and  wonders  are 
useful,  as  they  shake  us  out  of  the  mechanical  view  of 
things,  and  show  that  even  the  outward,  sensible  world  is 
full  of  spiritual  power. 

4.  We  may  also  believe  the   miracles   of  Jesus   to   bo 

8 


86     orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

natural  in  this  sense  —  that  under  the  same  conditions  they 
could  have  been  done  by  others,  and  that  they  are  probably 
prophetic  of  a  time  in  which  they  shall  be  done  by  others. 
Looked  at  as  mere  signs  or  portents^  he  himself  discouraged 
any  attention  being  paid  to  them.  Looked  at  as  logical 
pi'oofs  to  convince  an  unbeliever,  he  never  brought  them  for- 
ward. His  object  in  miracles,  as  stated  by  Mr.  Furness, 
was  simply  to  express  his  character.  Some,  indeed,  were 
symbolical,  as  the  cursing  of  the  fig  tree.  It  is  the  custom 
in  the  East  for  teachers  to  speak  in  symbolic  language. 

Miracles  were  at  first  believed,  on  low  grounds,  as  viola- 
tions of  law  by  a  God  outside  of  the  world.  Now  they  are 
disbelieved  on  scientific  grounds.  They  may  possibly  be 
believed  again  on  grounds  of  philosophy  and  historic  evi- 
dence, not  as  portents,  not  as  violations  of  law,  not  as  the 
basis  of  a  logical  argument,  but  as  the  natural  effluence  and 
outcome  of  a  soul  like  that  of  Jesus,  into  which  a  super- 
natural influx  of  light  and  life  had  descended.  They  are 
not  more  wonderful  than  nature  ;  they  are  not  so  wonderful 
as  the  change  of  heart  by  which  a  bad  man  becomes  a  good 
man.  But  they  will  find  their  proper  place  as  evidence  how 
plastic  the  lower  laws  are  to  the  influence  of  a  higher  life. 


ORTHODOX   IDEA    OP  THE   BIBLE.  87 


CHAPTER    V. 

OBTnODOX  IDEA  OF  THE   INSPIRATIOIT  AND  AUTHORITY  OP 
THE  BIBLE. 

§  1.  Subject  of  this  Chapter.  TJiree  Vieios  concerning  (Kb 
Bible.  —  The  subject  of  this  chapter  is  the  Orthodox  idea 
concerning  the  inspiration  and  authority  of  the  Bible.  We 
shall  consider  the  conflict  of  opinion  between  those  who  be- 
lieve in  the  full  inspiration  of  every  word  of  Scripture,  and 
those  who  treat  it  like  a  common  book,  and  endeavor  to  see 
how  far  we  ought  to  believe  a  fact  or  a  doctrine,  because  it 
is  asserted,  or  seems  to  be  asserted,  by  some  writer  in  the 
Bible. 

Such  questions  are  certainly  of  great  importance  to  us  all 
at  the  present  time,  when  opinions  on  these  subjects  are  un- 
settled, and  few  people  know  exactly  what  to  believe.  Espe- 
cially in  regard  to  the  Old  Testament,  not  many  persons 
have  any  distinct  notions.  They  do  not  know  what  is  its 
inspiration  or  its  authority ;  they  do  not  know  whether  they 
are  to  believe  the  account  of  the  creation  and  of  the  deluge 
in  the  book  of  Genesis,  in  opposition  to  the  geologists,  or  be- 
lieve the  geologists,  in  opposition  to  Genesis.  Certainly  it  is 
desirable,  if  we  can,  to  have  some  clear  and  distinct  opinions 
on  these  points. 

And,  first,  in  regard  to  Inspiration :  there  are  three 
main  and  leading  views  of  the  inspiration  of  the  Bible. 
There  cannot  be  a  fourth.  There  may  be  modifications  of 
these,  but  nothing  essentially  different.  These  three  views 
are, — 

(a.)   Plenary  Inspiration.  —  That  is,  that   everything  in 


80  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

the  Bible  is  the  word  of  God.  All  the  canonical  books  are 
inspired  by  God,  so  as  to  make  them  infallible  guides  to  faith 
and  practice.  Every  word  which  really  belongs  to  these 
books  is  God's  truth,  and  to  be  received  without  question  as 
truth,  no  matter  how  much  it  may  seem  opposed  to  reason, 
to  the  facts  of  nature,  to  common  sense,  and  common 
morality. 

This  is  the  Orthodox  theory  even  at  the  present  time. 
Any  variation  from  this  is  considered  a  deviation  into  heresy. 
No  doubt,  in  practice  it  is  deviated  from,  by  very  Orthodox 
people ;  but  all  Protestant  sects,  claiming  to  be  Orthodox, 
profess  to  hold  to  the  plenary  inspiration  of  the  Bible. 

(6.)  The  Bationalist  or  Naturalistic  View  of  the  Bible. — 
The  Bible  is  not  inspired  at  all,  or  at  least  in  no  way  differing 
from  any  other  book.  Its  authors  Avere  inspired,  perhaps, 
just  as  Homer,  or  Thucydides,  or  Cicero  were  inspired,  but 
not  differently.  It  has  no  authority^  therefore,  over  any  other 
book,  and  is  just  as  liable  to  be  in  error  as  any  other.  If 
you  should  bind  in  one  volume  the  histories  of  Herodotus, 
Tacitus,  Gibbon,  and  Mr.  Bancroft,  the  poems  of  Horace, 
Hafiz,  and  Dante,  and  the  letters  of  Cicero  and  Horace  Wal- 
pole,  this  collection  would  have  to  the  Naturalist  just  as 
.  much  authority  as  the  Bible. 

(c.)  The  mediatorial  view  of  the  Bible,  or  the  view  which 
mediates  between  the  others.  This  view  endeavors  to  recon- 
cile the  others,  by  accepting  the  truths  in  each,  and  eliminat- 
ing their  errors  or  defects. 

To  this  third  division  of  opinions  belong  those  of  a  large 
class,  who  are  not  prepared  to  accept  either  the  first  or  the 
second.  They  cannot  believe  every,  word  in  the  Bible  to  bo 
the  word  of  God,  for  they  find  things  in  it  contradicting  the 
evidence  of  history  and  the  intuitions  of  reason,  and  also  con- 
tradicting other  teachings  of  the  same  book.  They  cannot 
see  why,  as  Christians,  they  should  believe  everything  in  the 
Jewish  Scriptures.     As  Christians,  they  go  to  the  New  Tes- 


ORTHODOX   IDEA    OF   THE   BIBLE.  89 

tament  as  a  main  source  of  faith  anil  practice,  hut  do  not  see 
why  they  should  go  to  the  Old  Testament  for  Christian  truth. 
On  the  other  hand,  they  cannot  look  upon  the  Bible  as  a 
common  book.  They  remember  that  it  has  been  a  light  to 
the  world  for  thousands  of  years,  that  it  has  been  the  means 
of  awakening  the  human  intellect  and  heart,  of  reforming 
socitity,  and  purifying  lite.  Even  in  the  Old  Testament  they 
find  the  noblest  truth  and  the  teudei'est  piety.  The  Bible 
has  been  the  litany,  prayer-book,  inspirer,  comforter  of  na- 
tions and  centuries.  They  cannot  and  would  not  emancipate 
themselves  from  the  traditions  in  which  they  were  born,  nor 
cut  otf  history  behind  them.  The  Christian  Church  is  their 
mother  ;  she  has  taught  them  out  of  this  book  to  know  God, 
and  out  of  tliis  book  to  pray  to  him,  and  they  cannot  regard 
it  without  a  certain  prepossession. 

To  this  third  class  I  myself  belong.  I  would  not  be  unjust 
to  the  past  or  to  the  future.  I  would  be  loyal  to  truth,  and 
not  shut  my  eyes  to  what  God  reveals  which  is  new  ;  and  I 
would  not  be  unfaitlifiil  to  what  has  already  been  taught  me, 
or  ungrateful  for  the  love  which  has  taught  the  world  by  the 
mouths  of  past  prophets  and  apostles. 

§  2,  The  Di[jirnlt\j.  Antiquiti/  of  the  World,  and  Age  of 
Manldnd.  —  Let  us  then  see,  first,  what  the  problem  before 
us  is  ;  and  this  can  perhaps  be  best  understood  by  means  of 
an  example. 

The  common  opinion  among  Christians  is,  that  the  world 
was  made  four  thousand  and  four  yeai'S  before  Christ,  and 
that  all  mankind  are  descended  from  Adam  and  Eve.  These 
opinions  are  derived  from  the  book  of  Genesis,  which  tells  us 
that  after  God  had  made  the  world  and  other  things  in  five 
days,  on  the  sixth  day  he  made  man  in  his  own  image  ;  and 
that,  when  the  first  man,  Adam,  was  a  hundred  and  thirty 
years  old,  he  had  a  son,  named  Seth  ;  and  from  Seth,  accord- 
ing to  Genesis,  are  descended,  by  a  genealogy  given  in  the 
fifth  chapter  of  Genesis,  Noah  and  his  sons  ;  and  the  ages 
8* 


90  orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

being  given  from  Adam  down  to  Abraham,  and  from  Abra- 
ham to  Christ,  the  age  of  the  world  and  the  age  of  the  human 
race  have  been  computed. 

As  long  as  there  was  no  reason  for  supposing  any  dif- 
ferent period  for  the  antiquity  of  the  world,  these  numbers 
were  quietly  accepted.  But  various  new  facts  have  been 
noticed,  and  new  sciences  have  arisen,  within  the  past  fifty 
years,  which  have  thrown  doubt  upon  this  chronology.  In 
the  first  place  the  great  science  of  geology  has  examined  the 
rocky  leaves  which  envelop  the  surface  of  the  earth,  and 
has  found  written  upon  them  proofs  of  an  immense  antiquity. 
It  is  found  that  the  earth,  instead  of  being  created  four  thou- 
sand years  ago,  must  have  existed  for  myriads  of  years,  in 
order  to  have  given  time  for  the  changes  which  have  taken 
place  iu  its  structure.  This  evidence  was  long  doubted  and 
resisted  by  theologians,  as  they  supposed  in  the  interest  of 
Scripture  ;  but  the  evidence  was  too  strong  to  be  denied,  and 
no  intelligent  theologian,  however  Orthodox,  now  believes 
the  world  to  have  been  made  in  six  days,  or  to  have  been  cre- 
ated only  six  thousand  years  ago.  With  some,  the  six  days 
stand  for  immense  periods  of  time  ;  with  others,  the  whole 
story  is  considered  a  vision,  or  a  symbolical  account  of  geo- 
logical events  ;  but  no  one  takes  it  literally.  This  result  has 
come  from  the  overwhelming  amount  of  evidence  for  the 
antiquity  of  the  earth,  derived  mainly  from  the  fossil  rocks. 
Of  these  fossiliferous  rocks  there  are  over  thirty  distinct 
strata,  lying  superimposed,  in  a  regular  series,  each  filled 
with  the  remains  of  distinct  varieties  of  animals  or  of  plants. 
These  rocks  must  each  have  been  an  immense  period  of  time 
ui  being  formed,  for  the  shells  which  they  contain,  although 
very  delicate,  are  unbroken,  and  could  only  be  slowly  de- 
posited in  the  quiet  depths  of  a  great  ocean.  There  are  also 
evidences  that  after  these  strata  were  formed,  violent  and 
sudden  upheavals  took  place,  throwing  them  into  new  posi- 
tions, then  slow  uprisings  of  the  bottom  of  the  sea,  or  slow 


ORTHODOX   IDEA    OF   THE    BIBLE.  91 

subsidings  of  the  land.  At  one  time  the  northern  parts  of 
Europe  and  America  were  covered  with  ice.  Great  glaciers 
extended  over  tlie  whole  of  Switzerland,  and  icebergs  floated 
from  the  mountains  of  Berkshire  in  Massachusetts  upon  a 
sea  which  filled  the  valley  of  the  Connecticut  River,  drop- 
ping erratic  blocks  of  stone,  taken  from  those  mountains,  in 
straight  lines,  parallel  with  each  other,  half  way  across  the 
valley,  where  they  still  lie.  Similar  icebergs  floated  from 
Snowdon,  in  Wales,  and  Ben  Lomond,  in  Scotland,  over  the 
submerged  islands  of  Great  Britain.  At  one  time  the  whole 
surface  of  the  earth,  instead  of  being  covered  with  icy  gla- 
ciers, was  filled  with  a  hot,  damp  atmosphere,  laden  with 
carbonic  gas,  Avhich  no  creature  could  breathe,  but  in  which 
grew  great  forests  of  a  strange  tropical  vegetation.  Then 
came  another  period,  in  which  all  these  forests  wei'e  sub- 
merged and  buried,  and  at  last  turned  into  coal.  Long;  after 
this  hot  period  had  passed,  and  long  after  the  cold,  glacial 
period,  which  followed  it,  had  departed,  came  a  time  when 
the  elephant,  the  rhinoceros,  and  the  hippopotamus  covered 
the  whole  of  Europe,  and  the  mammoth  roamed  in  North 
America.  Such  facts  as  these,  incontestably  established  by 
the  amplest  evidence,  have  made  it  impossible  for  any  rea- 
sonable man  to  believe  that  the  earth  was  made  in  six  days, 
or  that  it  was  made  only  six  thousand  years  ago. 

But  this  question  being  thus  disposed  of,  other  questions 
arise  in  their  turn.  Are  all  mankind  descended  from  one 
pair,  or  from  many?  Has  the  human  race  existed  on  the 
earth  only  six  thousand  years,  or  during  a  longer  period? 
Was  the  deluge  of  Noah  a  real  event?  and  if  so,  was  it 
universal  or  partial?  Did  the  sun  stand  still  at  the  com- 
mand of  Joshua?  or  is  that  only  a  poetic  image  taken  from 
an  ancient  book  of  poems  —  the  book  of  Jasher  ?  Is  there 
any  truth  in  the  story  of  the  passage  of  the  Red  Sea  by  the 
Israelites?  of  the  passage  of  the  Jordan?  of  the  walls  of 
Jericho  falling  when  the  trumpets  were  blown  ?  of  the  story 


92     orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

of  Samson  ?  If  we  once  begin  to  doubt  and  disbelieve  the 
accounts'  in  the  Bible,  where  shall  we  stop?  What  rule 
shall  we  have  by  which  to  distinguish  the  true  from  the 
false?  Is  it  safe  to  begin  to  question  and  deny?  Is  it  not 
safer  to  accept  the  whole  book  as  the  word  of  God,  and  to 
let  everything  in  it  stand  unexamined? 

No  !  "  It  is  never  safe,"  said  Luther,  "  to  do  anything 
against  the  truth  !  "  Truth  alone  is  safe  ;  and  his  soul  only 
is  safe  who  loves  and  honors  truth  more  than  human  appro- 
bation—  more  than  ease,  comfort,  or  life.  It  is  not  safe  to 
pretend  to  believe  what  we  do  not.  And  in  this  instance, 
half  of  the  infidelity  of  the  age  and  country  has  come  from 
the  teaching  that  everything  in  the  Bible  is  the  word  of  God. 
Sincere  men  have  been  disgusted  when  told  they  must  be- 
lieve things  contrary  to  their  common  sense  and  reason. 

Another  question,  which  is  now  being  investigated,  is  the 
age  of  mankind  —  the  antiquity  of  the  human  race.  The 
Bible  gives  the  list  of  generations  from  Adam  to  Abraham ; 
and  the  length  of  each,  and  other  data,  given  in  Scripture, 
make  six  thousand  years  for  the  life  of  man  on  this  earth. 
Greek  history  only  goes  back  some  twenty-three  hundred 
years ;  the  Egyptian  monuments  go  back  fifteen  hundred  or 
two  thousand  years  earlier  —  to  2000  B.  C,  or  3000  B.  C. 
The  "  Vedas,"  in  India,  may  have  been  written  1500  B.  C. ; 
the  "  Kings,"  in  China,  before  that.  But  recently  we  have 
been  carried  back  to  a  yet  earlier  period,  —  to  a  time  when 
man  existed  on  the  earth,  before  any  written  monument 
or  sculptured  stone  which  now  exists.  Two  diiferent  sources 
have  Ijcen  discovered  within  a  few  years,  —  one  of  them  by 
philology,  the  other  by  geology. 

It  has  been  found  that  the  languages  spoken  by  Europeans, 
in  their  airy  sounds,  are  more  permanent  monuments  than 
granite  or  enduring  brass.  Stamped  on  these  light,  impon- 
derable words  are  marks  of  a  gray  antiquity  going  back  to 
times  before  Herodotus,  before  Moses  and  the  book  of  Gene- 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OF   THE   BIBLE.  93 

sis,  before  the  Vedas  iu  India,  before  the  Zendavesta  in 
Persia.  It  has  been  proved,  first,  that  nearly  all  the  lan- 
guages of  Europe  belong  to  one  linguistic  family,  and  there- 
fore that  those  who  speak  them  were  originally  of  one  race. 
These  different  languages  —  seven  sister  languages,  daugh- 
ters of  a  language  now  wholly  gone  —  are  the  Sanscrit  or 
ancieni  Hindoo,  the  Zend  or  ancient  Persian,  the  Greek,  the 
Latin,  the  Keltic,  the  German,  and  the  Slavic  languages. 
By  a  comparison  of  these,  it  has  been  found  that  originally 
there  lived,  east  of  the  Caspian,  a  race  of  shepherds  and 
hunters,  calling  themselves  Aryan  ;  tliat  one  branch  descended 
into  India  at  least  five  thousand  years  ago,  and  drove  out 
the  aboriginal  inhabitants,  a  second  branch  went  into  Per- 
sia, a  third  into  Italy,  a  fourth  into  Greece,  a  fifth  vast  im- 
migration filled  Northern  Europe  Avith  the  Kelts,  a  sixth 
with  Scandinavians  and  Germans,  and  a  seventh  with  the 
Slaves.  But  long  ago  as  this  immigration  was,  —  before  all 
history,  —  it  found  aboriginal  inhabitants  everywhere,  whose 
descendants  remain.  The  Lapps  and  Finns  in  Northern 
Europe,  the  Basques  in  Spain,  and  Magyars  in  Hungary, 
are  probably  descended  fi'om  this  earlier  European  race. 
It  is  difficult  to  suppose  mankind  only  six  thousand  years 
old,  when  we  find  such  great  movements  taking  place  four 
or  five  thousand  years  ago. 

But  now  come  the  geologists,  and  tell  us  that  they  find 
evidence  of  three  different  races  existing  in  Europe  in  three 
distinct  periods  of  civilization,  some  of  which  probably  pre- 
ceded the  immigration  of  these  Indo-European  races.  These 
three  belong  to  what  they  call  the  Stone,  the  Bronze,  and 
the  Iron  Age.  In  the  gravel  and  drift,  from  ten  to  twenty 
feet  below  the  surface,  along  with  the  bones  of  the  elephant 
and  the  rhinoceros,  and  other  animals  long  since  extinct,  are 
found  hundreds  of  flint  instruments,  axes,  arrow-heads,  and 
tools,  indicating  that  men  lived  in  Europe  in  great  numbers, 
contemporaries  with  these  extinct  animals.     If  this  should 


94  orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

be  proved,  we  should  then  be  brought  to  admit,  with  respect 
to  the  antiquity  of  man,  what  we  have  already  admitted  with 
regard  to  the  antiquity  of  the  world,  that  the  account  in 
Genesis  is  not  to  be  understood  as  theologians  have  hitherto 
taught ;  that  is,  that  we  must  not  go  to  Genesis,  but  to  phi- 
lology and  geology,  for  our  knowledge  of  the  most  ancient 
history. 

In  this  case,  then,  it  will  be  evident  that  the  old  notion  of 
a  literal  inspiration  cannot  be  maintained.  God  certainly 
did  not  inspire  men  to  teach  anything  about  the  creation 
which  was  adapted  to  mislead  and  deceive  men  for  two 
thousand  years.  We  shall  be  obliged  to  say,  then,  that 
Moses  was  not  inspired  to  teach  geology  or  history ;  that 
what  he  taught  on  these  subjects  he  taught  from  such 
sources  as  were  available  to  him,  and  that  he  was  liable  to 
error. 

The  old  Orthodox  theory  of  plenary  inspiration  has  re- 
ceived very  damaging  blows  from  such  scientific  researches 
as  these  which  we  have  been  describing.  The  letter  of  the 
Bible  seems,  in  such  cases,  to  be  at  war  with  the  facts  of 
nature. 

§  3.  Basis  of  the  Orthodox  Theory  of  Inspiration. — Why, 
.then,  should  the  Orthodox  doctrine  be  so  stoutly  maintained? 
What  are  the  reasons  used  in  its  defence  ?  What  its  arguments  ? 
What  is  its  basis?  On  what  does  it  rest?  Do  the  writers 
of  the  Bible  say  that  they  were  inspired  by  God  to  write 
these  books?  Not  at  all.  Do  they  claim  infallibility? 
Nowhere.  Do  they  lay  down  any  doctrine  of  plenary,  ver- 
bal, literal  inspiration?  No.  We  do  not  even  know  who 
wrote  many  of  these  books.  We  do  not  know  who  collected 
them,  or  why  just  these  books  were  put  into  the  collection, 
and  no  others.  The  Orthodox  theory  rests  on  few  facts,  but 
is  mainly  an  assumption.  It  seemed  necessaiy  that  there 
should  be  authority  somewhere ;  and  when  Protestants  re- 
jected the  authority  of  the  Church,  they  took  the  Bible  in 


ORTHODOX   IDEA    OF   THE    BIBLE.  95 

its  place.    The  doctrine  of  inspiration,  therefore,  was  adopted 
as  a  basis  for  the  authority  of  the  Bible. 

The  principal  reason  given  by  those  who  believe  in  the 
plenary  inspiration  of  the  Bible,  for  holding  to  this  doctrine, 
is  the  necessity  of  some  authority.  The  argument  is  this : 
Unless  every  part  of  the  Bible  is  believed  to  be  fully  inspired, 
some  part  of  it  may  be  believed  to  be  erroneous  ;  and  if  we 
admit  error  in  any  part,  the  Bible  loses  its  authority,  and 
we  do  not  know  what  to  believe.  The  doctrine  of  literal  and 
plenary  inspiration  rests,  therefore,  in  the  last  analysis,  on 
no  basis  of  fact,  but  on  a  purely  a  priori  argument.  Let  us 
therefore  examine  this  argument,  and  see  what  is  its  force. 

Revelation,  it  is  said,  is  a  communication  of  truth  with 
authority.  It  is  truth  shown  to  us  by  God,  not  truth  rea- 
soned out  by  man.  Its  value  is,  that  we  can  rely  upon  it 
entirely,  live  by  it,  die  by  it,  without  doubt  or  hesitation. 
We  do  not  want  speculation,  opinion,  probability ;  we  want 
certainty ;  otherwise  religion  ceases  to  be  a  power,  and  be- 
comes a  mere  intellectual  amusement. 

The  only  religion,  it  is  added,  which  is  of  any  real  value, 
is  that  which  carries  with  it  this  authority.  The  outward 
■world,  with  its  influences  and  its  temptations,  is  so  strong, 
that  Ave  shall  be  swept  away  by  it  imless  we  can  oppose  to  it 
some  inward  conviction  as  solid  and  real.  Amid  the  temp- 
tations of  the  senses,  the  allurements  of  pleasure,  the  deceit- 
fulness  of  riches,  will  it  enable  a  man  to  hold  fast  to  honesty, 
temperance,  purity,  generosity  —  to  believe  that  in  all  proba- 
bility these  things  are  right,  and  that  there  is  something  .o 
be  said  in  favor  of  the  opinion  that  God  approves  of  them? 

Will  it  help  him,  to  think  that  unless  the  writer  of  tho 
Gospel  is  mistaken,  or  his  words  mistranslated,  Christ  may 
have  said  that  goodness  leads  to  heaven,  and  sin  to  hell? 
No.  We  need  authority  in  order  to  have  certainty  ;  and  we 
need  certainty  in  our  convictions  in  order  that  they  should 
influence  us  deeply  and  permanently. 


96     orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

This  is  the  chief  argument  in  favor  of  the  plenary  inspira- 
tion *  of  the  Bible.  We  see  it  amounts  to  this  —  that  it  is 
very  desirable,  for  practical  purposes,  that  we  should  believe 
everything  in  the  Bible  to  be  true.f 

In  reply  to  this,  we  ought  first  to  say,  that  the  question  in 
all  these  cases  is  not,  What  is  desirable?  but.  What  is  true? 
We  should  begin  by  investigating  the  facts.  We  should  ask. 
Does  the  Bible  anywhere  say  of  itself  that  it  is  inspired  in 
this  sense?  Do  any  of  the  writers  of  the  Bible  declare 
themselves  to  be  thus  inspired,  so  that  all  that  they  say  is 
absolutely  true  in  every  particular?  Does  Christ  say  that 
those  who  are  to  write  the  Gospels  or  the  Epistles  of  the 
New  Testament  shall  be  thus  guarded  against  every  possible 
error?  Or  is  there  any  evidence  in  the  books  themselves 
that  the  writers  were  thus  protected?  Do  they  never  con- 
tradict each  other  or  themselves  ?  Do  they  never  contradict 
facts  of  nature  or  facts  of  history? 

Now,  to  all  these  questions,  we  are  obliged  to  say,  No. 
The  Bible  claims  no  such  absolute  inspiration  for  itself.  It 
says  that  "  holy  men  of  old  spake  as  they  were  moved  by  the 
Holy  Spirit,"  but  it  does  not  say  that  the  Holy  Spirit  made 
them  infallible.     It  says,  "  All  Scripture  is  given  by  inspira- 


*  We  use  the  term  "  plenary  inspiration  "  ratlier  than  "  literal  inspiration," 
or  "  verbal  inspiration,"  for  "  literal  inspiration  "  is  a  contradiction  in  terms, 
like  "  bodily  spirit." 

t  Tholuck,  in  his  Essay  on  the  Doctrine  of  Inspiration,  ascribes  the  origin 
of  the  belief  in  the  infallibility  of  Scripture  to  this  supposed  need  of  an  author- 
itative outward  rule  of  faith  among;  Protestants.  He  says,  "  In  proportion  as 
controversy,  sharpened  by  Jesuitism,  made  the  Protestant  party  sensible  of 
the  necessity  of  an  externally  fortified  ground  of  combat,  in  that  same  propor- 
tion did  Protestantism  seek,  by  the  exaltation  of  the  outward  authoritative 
character  of  the  Sacred  Writings,  to  recover  that  infallible  Authority  which  it 
had  lost  through  its  rejection  of  inspired  councils  and  the  infallible  authority 
of  the  pope.  In  this  manner  arose,  not  earlier  than  the  seventeenth  century, 
those  sentiments  which  regarded  the  Holy  Scripture  as  the  infallible  produc- 
tion of  the  Divine  Spirit,  —  in  its  entire  contents  and  its  very  form,  —  so  that 
not  only  the  sense,  but  also  the  words,  the  letters,  the  Hebrew  vowel  points, 
and  the  very  punctuation  were  regarded  as  proceeding  from  the  Spirit  of  God," 
—  Tkolvck's  Essay  —  Noyes's  "  Collection." 


ORTHODOX    IDKA    OF   THE   BIBLE.  97 

tion,  and  is  profitable  for  doctrine,"  but  it  does  not  say 
what  are  the  limits  of  Scripture  ;  and  to  be  profitable  or 
useful  for  doctrine  is  surely  not  the  same  thing  as  to  have 
inlallible  authority  over  belief.  Besides,  if  those  who  wrote 
certain  Scriptures  were  infallibly  inspired,  those  who  col- 
lected the  present  books  of  the  Old  and  New  Testament, 
and  made  our  canon,  vfere^  not  so  inspired.  Those  who 
transcribed  their  autographic  manuscripts  were  not  inspired. 
The  manuscripts  of  the  Gospels  and  Epistles,  written  by 
their  authors,  have  long  since  perished.  There  were  no 
autograph  collectors  in  ancient  times.  There  was  no  such 
reverence  then  paid  to  the  letter  of  religion,  to  cause  the 
original  manuscript  of  an  apostle  to  be  kept  in  a  church  as 
a  sacred  relic.  We  have  plenty  of  pieces  of  wood  claiming 
to  be  parts  of  the  true  cross,  but  not  a  manuscript  claiming 
to  be  the  original  writing  of  an  apostle.  The  earliest  manu- 
script goes  only  to  the  fourth  century,  and  that  contains  the 
Epistle  of  Barnabas.  If,  then,  the  writers  of  the  New  Tes- 
tament were  inspired,  those  who  collected  their  writings  were 
not  inspired,  and  may  have  left  out  the  right  books,  and  put 
in  the  wrong  ones.  Those  who  copied  their  manuscripts 
were  not  inspired,  and  may  have  left  out  the  right  words, 
and  put  in  wrong  ones.  Those  who  translated  their  manu- 
scripts were  not  inspired,  and  may  have  made  mistakes  in 
their  translating.  So  that,  after  all,  the  plenary  inspiration 
of  the  apostles  does  not  bestow  that  infallibility  upon  our 
English  Bible  which  this  theory  demands  in  order  to  give  it 
authority. 

And  yet  we  admit  the  importance  of  having  some  au- 
thority. Truth  which  does  not  come  with  authority  is  not. 
truth  ;  it  is  only  speculation  ;  it  cannot  influence  life.  Reve- 
lation and  philosophy  differ  in  this,  that  philosophy  tells  us 
what  men  think  about  God,  revelation  what  God  thinks 
about  men.  Revelation  is  the  di'awing  aside  of  the  veil 
which  hides  God,  duty,  immortality.  It  does  not  give  us 
9 


98       ORTHODOXY  *.  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

speculations  about  them,  but  shows  us  the  things  them- 
selves. 

If,  therefore,  we  can  show  that  the  Bible  can  be  authority 
without  heing  plenarily  inspired,  very  possibly  Orthodoxy 
would  no  longer  cling  to  this  doctrine  with  such  remarkable 
tenacity.  This  point  of  authority  we  shall  consider  in  another 
section  of  this  chapter,  and  so  we  will  say  no  more  about  it 
now.  We  shall  try  to  show,  then,  that  the  Bible  may  be, 
and  is  authority,  without  being  inspired  as  regards  every 
page  and  word,  and  that  inspiration  is  one  thing  and  infalli- 
bility another.  At  present  we  desire  to  see  the  truth  there 
is  in  the  Orthodox  doctrine  of  inspiration. 

§  4.  Inspiration  in  general^  or  Natural  Inspiration.  — 
There  is  a  foundation  for  inspiration  in  human  nature,  a 
capacity  for  inspiration  which  all  possess.  Were  it  not  so, 
Christian  inspiration  would  be  something  unnatural,  and  not 
in  the  order  of  providence.  Moreover,  we  commonly  speak 
of  the  inspiration  of  the  poet,  the  painter,  the  inventor,  the 
man  of  genius.  The  man  of  genius  is  he  who  has  more  of 
this  capacity  for  inspiration  than  other  men.  But  all  men 
have  it  in  a  greater  or  a  less  degree.  All  men  have  their 
hours  or  moments  of  inspiration.  By  these  experiences  of 
their  own,  they  understand  the  larger  inspirations  of  genius. 
If  we  distribute  the  thoughts  we  possess  according  to  their 
source,  we  shall  find  that  we  have  obtained  them  all,  either 
from  other  persons,  or  by  means  of  mental  effort,  or  by  inspi- 
ration. The  largest  part  of  our  thoughts  and  opinions  we 
have  taken  in  ready  made,  and  reproduced  them  just  as 
vv'^e  received  them.  We  suppose  ourselves  thinking,  when 
we  utter  them,  but  we  are  only  remembering.  A  much 
smaller  proportion  of  our  thoughts  we  have  obtained  reflec- 
tively, by  personal  efforts  of  the  active  intellect.  Another 
part  are  those  which  hiive  come  to  us  in  some  happy  mo- 
ments, when  the  inner  eye  was  unclouded,  and  when  we  seem 
to  see  at  a  glance  truth  and  beauty.    These  inspired  momenta 


ORTHODOX   IDEA    OF   THK    BIBLE.  99 

give  us  the  most  solid  knowledge  we  have.  They  are  mental 
experiences,  which  are  the  master  lights  of  all  our  being. 
They  give  direction  and  unity  to  all  our  other  thoughts  and 
opinions.  They  constitute  mental  originality.  The  pecu- 
liarity of  inspiration,  in  this  general  sense,  does  not  lie  in 
the  subjects  of  the  thoughts,  but  in  the  manner  of  their 
(oming.  Ideas  and  thoughts  of  very  different  kinds  may 
all  be  inspired  thoughts.  The  poet,  the  artist,  have  their 
inspirations.  But  the  scholar,  the  thinker,  has  his  also. 
The  man  who  invents  a  machine  often  has  the  idea  come 
to  him  by  an  inspiration.  The  man  who  discovers  a  con- 
tinent has  seen  it  in  idea  before  he  sees  it  in  reality.  If 
Shakespeare  was  an  inspired  man,  so  was  Newton,  so  was 
Columbus,  so  was  Lord  Bacon,  so  w-as  Faust  wheu  he  dis- 
covered printing.  Watt  when  he  improved  the  steam  engine, 
and  Daguerre  when  he  found  out  photographic  pictures  ;  for, 
in  all  great  discoveries  and  inventions,  and  in  small  ones 
too,  the  original  idea  is  an  inspiration,  though  it  has  to  be 
worked  out  mechanically  by  hard  thinking. 

It  will  be  seen,  then,  what  we  understand  by  inspiration,  in 
this  general  sense.  It  is  a  mental  sight,  corresponding  as 
nearly  as  anything  can  to  physical  sight.  It  seems,  in  the 
inspired  moment,  as  if  we  looked  into  another  world,  and 
saw  new  truths  and  facts  there.  We  do  not  bring  them  up 
out  of  our  memory ;  we  see  them  in  all  their  own  fresh  life 
and  reality.  We  do  not  think  them  out  by  an  effort  of  the 
will ;  we  stand  still  and  see  them.  All  that  our  will  has  to 
do  with  it  is  negative  rather  than  positive.  It  is  to  keep  ofl' 
disturbing  influences  of  memory  and  sense,  to  hold  the  mind 
still,  attentive,  receptive,  and  ready.  If  we  believe  in  these 
inspirations,  we  can  thus  prepare  the  way  for  them,  but 
nothing  more.  We  can  wait  and  look,  till  the  vision  is  pre- 
sented, and  then  we  shall  see  it ;  but  this  is  all.  The  man 
of  genius  is  he  who  believes  in  these  inspirations,  and  so 
looks  for  them.      What  he  shall  see  will  depend  on  what  he 


100    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

looks  for.  The  man  whose  taste  is  in  the  world  of  imagina- 
tion looksfor  forms  of  poetic  or  artistic  beauty,  and  so  sees 
these.  Every  man  looks  for  that  which  he  is  most  interested 
in,  whether  he  be  metaphysician  or  mechanic.  The  world 
of  ideal  beauty  and  truth,  which  overhangs  ours,  has  a  thou- 
sand portals,  and  we  can  pass  in  through  one  or  another,  and 
see  that  which  suits  our  various  tastes  and  desires.  Mem- 
ory, reflection,  and  sight,  — these  are  the  three  sources  of  our 
thoughts.  The  inspired  man  is  a  seer  —  he  has  insight  and 
foresight ;  and  these  objects  of  mental  sight  are  to  him 
more  real  and  certain  than  any  others.  But  he  is  unable  to 
prove  their  reality  or  justify  them  to  the  sceptic.  And 
hence  his  fate  is  often  that  of  Cassandra,  —  to  be  a  true 
prophet,  but  not  to  be  believed,  until  by  and  by  the  strength 
of  his  own  conviction  wins  its  way,  and  produces  faith  in 
others. 

There  are,  therefore,  two  principal  intellectual  states  of 
the  mind  —  the  one  receptive,  the  other  plastic;  the  one  by 
which  it  takes  in  truth,  the  other  by  which  it  works  it  up 
into  shape.  By  the  one  it  obtains  the  substance  of  thought, 
by  the  other  the  form  of  thought.  The  one  may  be  called 
the  perceptive  state,  the  other  the  reflective  state.  Thus, 
tpo,  we  see  that  the  perceptive  faculty  may  be  exercised  in 
two  directions,  outwardly  and  inwardly.  It  is  the  same  in- 
tellectual faculty  which,  through  the  senses,  looks  at  and 
perceives  the  outward  material  universe,  and  through  the 
mind  itself,  the  inward  world  of  thought.  It  is  this  power 
of  looking  inward  which  gives  us  all  that  we  call  inspiration. 
We  have,  thus,  outsight  and  insight. 

There  is,  then,  a  universal  inspiration,  on  which  the  spe- 
cial inspiration  of  the  Old  and  New  Testament  rests.  There 
are  inspired  men  and  uninspired  men.  There  are  inspired 
writings  and  uninspired  writings.  There  is  a  general  inspi- 
ration, out  of  which  the  particular  inspiration  of  Bible  writers 
gi-ew.     Universal  inspiration  is  a  genus,  of  which  this  is  a 


ORTHODOX   IDEA   OP  THE  BIBLE.  101 

species.  We  cannot  understand  the  inspiration  of  the  writers 
of  the  Bible  till  we  understand  this  universal  inspiration  on 
which  it  rests.  "We  can  best  explain  the  special  inspiration 
of  Scripture  by  first  knowing  tlie  general  inspirations  of 
mankind. 

Mr.  Emerson,  in  one  of  his  poems,  called  the  "  Problem,'' 
describes  this  universal  inspiration.  He  describes  Phidias 
as  being  inspired  to  make  his  Jupiter,  as  well  as  the  prophets 
to  write  their  burdens.  He  says  the  architect  that  made 
St.  Peter's  was  guided  by  some  divine  instinct  in  his  heart  — 
he  wrought  in  a  sad  sincerity.  He  says  we  cannot  tell  how 
such  buildings  as  the  Parthenon  and  St.  Peter's  were  built, 
any  more  than  how  the  bird  builds  its  nest ;  they  were  formed 
by  a  natural  architecture  ;  they  grew  as  the  grass  grows  ;  they 
came  out  of  thought's  interior  sphere,  just  as  the  pine  tree 
adds  a  myriad  of  new  leaves  to  its  old  arms  every  year. 

"  The  passive  master  lout  his  hand 
To  the  vast  soul  tliat  o'er  him  planned ; 
And  the  same  power  that  reared  the  shrino 
Bestrode  the  tribes  that  knelt  within." 

§  5.  Christian  or  Siqiernatural  Inspiration.  —  Having  thus 
spoken  of  inspiration  in  general,  we  proceed  to  speak  of 
Christian  inspiration  in  particular. 

Christian  inspiration  is  the  work  of  the  Holy  Spii'it  on  the 
heart.  It  is  that  influence  which  came  to  the  apostles,  and 
to  all  Christians  after  Jesus  had  left  the  earth,  to  unite  them 
inwaixlly  Avith  Christ,  and  to  show  them  the  true  Christ.  It 
is  that  if  which  Paul  speaks,  when  he  says,  It  pleased  God 
to  reveal  his  Son  in  me.  All  Christians  were  baptized  with 
the  Holy  Ghost ;  had  the  spirit  of  Christ  dwelling  in  them ; 
were  led  by  the  spirit  of  God ;  received  the  spirit  of  adop- 
tion, which  bore  Avitness  that  they  were  the  sons  of  God ; 
which  helped  their  infii-mities  ;  helped  them  to  pray  ;  en- 
abled them  to  mortify  the  deeds  of  the  body,  and  produced 
many  gifts  and  graces.  It  is  quite  certain  that  all  Christians 
9* 


102     ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

were  expected  to  partake  of  this  Christian  inspiration.  This 
enabled  them  inwardly  to  see  and  know  Christ  —  the  true 
Christ.     And  only  thus  could  they  become  truly  his. 

Now,  the  Christian  inspiration,  so  necessary  at  first,  is 
equally  necessary  now,  for  its  object  is,  as  it  was  then,  to 
turn  nominal  Christians  into  living  Christians ;  to  turn  his- 
torical Christianity  into  vital  Christianity ;  to  enable  those 
who  already  know  Christ  after  the  flesh,  also  to  know  him 
after  the  spirit.  What  is  it  which  we  need  for  comfort,  im- 
provement, usefulness  ?  We  need  a  living,  practical  faith  in 
God's  truth  and  love.  We  need  to  see  it  as  we  now  see  the 
outward  world.  We  believe  in  the  inevitable  retribution  of 
God's  laws.  We  need  to  see  this  ;  to  see  that  selfishness  is 
death,  and  generosity  life  ;  to  see  that  humility  is  exaltation, 
and  that  pride  is  abasement.  Having  seen  law,  we  need  also 
to  see  grace,  the  reality  of  forgiveness,  the  reality  of  a  Fa- 
ther's love.  We  need  to  see  immortality  and  eternity,  while 
we  are  yet  surrounded  with  the  world  of  sense  and  time  ;  to 
see  that  the  two  worlds  are  not  two,  but  one,  all  temporal 
things  having  their  roots  in  spiritual  things.  This  is  what 
we  need  for  comfort,  for  no  hardship  would  seem  hard  while 
we  were  thus  looking  at  the  things  which  are  eternal,  and 
knowing  that  every  light  affliction  works  out  an  eternal 
Weight  of  glory.  This  is  what  we  need  for  improvement. 
For  no  efforts  at  improvement  can  accomplish  that  which 
this  inward  inspiration  can  do.  It  is  a  tide  which  bears 
us  on.  It  takes  from  us  the  weight  of  years.  It  is  the  sap 
which  rises  into  every  branch,  penetrates  every  twig,  swells 
the  buds,  expands  the  leaves,  opens  the  blossoms,  ripens  the 
fruit,  and  causes  universal  growth.  And  it  is  what  we  need 
for  usefulness.  For  how  mechanical  and  lifeless  are  efforts 
at  usefulness  which  proceed  merely  from  the  sense  of  duty ! 
How  blessed  are  those  which  proceed  from  a  heart  filled  with 
love  and  peace ! 

Christian  inspiration,  then,  reveals  inwardly  the  spirit  of 


ORTHODOX   IDEA    OP  THE   BIBLE.  103 

Christ,  and  so  gives  us  a  new  heart,  and  makes  of  us  new 
creatures.  It  is  the  most  essential  and  vital  part  of  Ciiris- 
tianity,  yet  it  is  that  part  of  Christianity  which  is  the  least 
known  and  prized.  How  many  dogmatists  there  are  fight- 
ing for  doctrines ;  how  many  ceremonialists  earnest  about 
forms ;  how  many  conscientious  Christians  trying  hard  to  do 
their  duties  ;  —  to  one  spiritual  Christian,  whose  Christianity 
consists  in  living  in  the  spirit,  that  he  may  walk  in  the 
spirit ! 

One  reason  for  this  seems  to  be  the  prevalence  of  false 
views  concerning  the  nature  of  Christian  inspii'ation.  It  has 
been  regarded  as  AvhoUy  different  in  its  laws  from  other  in- 
spiration, as  an  arbitrary  influence  Avithout  laws  or  condi- 
tions. Now,  in  fact,  the  inspiration  of  the  Christian,  while 
it  differs  in  its  subject  from  that  of  the  poet,  rests  on  the 
same  mental  faculty,  and  has  analogous  conditions.  The 
condition  of  the  poet's  inspiration  is,  that  loving  the  outward 
beauty  of  the  natural  world,  and  faithfully  studying  its  truth, 
he  should  then  hold  himself  ready,  iu  strong  desire,  to  see, 
inwardly,  ideal  truth  and  ideal  beauty.  And  so  the  Chris- 
tian, believing  in  the  outward  Christ,  and  loving  him,  holds 
himself  expectant  of  an  inward  revelation  of  that  same  Jesus 
in  his  glorified  and  higher  influence.  All  inspiration  has  its 
conditions  and  laws.  The  poet's  eye,  in  its  fine  frenzy,  must 
look  from  heaven  to  earth,  and  from  earth  to  heaven.  His 
inward  inspiration  is  in  strict  accordance  Avith  his  outward 
occupation  and  his  outward  fidelity.  Every  man  is  inwardly 
inspired,  according  to  the  nature  of  his  outward  work. 
Shakespeare  cannot  discover  America,  nor  Columbus  write 
Hamlet.  And  it  is  only  he  who  believes  in  Christ-,  and  so 
endeavors  to  obey  and  serve  him,  who  receives  au  inward 
sight  of  his  essential  spirit.  Christian  inspiration  is  not  arbi- 
trary, is  not  unnatural,  is  not  limited.  It  is  the  life  of 
Christ,  flowing  steadily  and  constantly  into  all  hearts  which 


104    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

are  prepared  for  it,  which  loug  for  it,  and  which  hold  them- 
selves ready  to  receive  it. 

We  ai'e  thus  prepared  to  state  more  distinctly  the  differ- 
ence between  inspiration  in  general  and  Christian  inspu'ation 
in  particular. 

(a.)  These  two  inspirations  resemhle  each  other  in  result- 
ing from  the  exercise  of  the  same  mental  faculties,  since  the 
state  of  mind  in  both  cases  is  not  that  of  reflection,  but  per- 
ception ;  and  the  perception  is  inward  perception.  Newton 
fixes  his  mind  steadily  upon  the  confused  mathematical 
thought  within  till  it  becomes  clear.  Milton  fixes  his  mind 
upon  the  inward  image  of  ideal  truth  and  beauty  till  it 
grows  so  distinct  that  he  can  put  it  into  corresponding 
words.  Columbus  meditates  upon  the  thought  of  a  Western 
Continent  till  it  seems  so  plain  to  him  that  he  is  ready  to  set 
sail  for  it.  And  so  Paul  and  John  look  steadily  at  the  Christ 
formed  within  them  till  they  see  clearly  what  is  Christ's 
thought  concerning  every  question,  every  subject. 

(&.)  The  two  inspirations  also  are  alike  in  this,  that  the 
truth  seen  is  in  both  cases,  as  to  its  substance,  given  to  us 
by  God.  For  the  truths  seen  by  Newton,  Milton,  Des- 
cartes, and  Columbus  Avere  not  inventions  of  theirs,  but 
divine  realities  shown  to  them  by  God. 

(c.)  In  both  cases  the  form  of  the  truth  seen  comes  from 
the  exercise  of  the  human  faculties  of  each  individual  upon 
the  substance  thus  given.  For  Paul  and  John,  no  less  than 
Newton  and  Milton,  worked  up  in  their  own  minds  the  truth 
seen.  This  is  evident  from  the  fact,  that,  while  their 
writings  agree  in  contents  and  substance  with  each  other, 
they  differ  from  each  other  in  form  and  style.  Each  writer 
of  the  New  Testament  has  his  own  distinctly  marked  style, 
not  only  of  expression,  but  also  of  thought. 

(cZ.)  They  are  alike  also  in  combining  tinith  of  substance 
with  fallibility  of  statement.  The  substance  of  every  inspired 
man's  thought  is  truth,  because  it  is  the  reality  shown  to 


ORTHODOX   IDEA    OP   THE   BIBLE.  105 

him  by  God.  The  form  in  which  he  expresses  it  varies 
more  or  less  from  tliis  truth,  because  that  comes  from  the 
exercise  of  his  own  finite  facuhies.  Newton  and  Milton 
looked  at  God's  truths,  and  uttered  them  as  well  as  they  were 
able.  So  did  Paul  and  John.  That  these  last  were  liable 
to  err  in  matters  of  statement  appears  from  the  fact  that 
they  did  err  in  some  matters,  as,  for  example,  in  regard  to 
the  speedy  coming  of  Christ. 

These  being  the  resemblances  between  natural  and  super- 
natural inspiration,  what  are  the  differences  ? 

(a.)  The  first  difterence  is  in  the  kind  of  truths  seen.  The 
truths  seen  by  Newton  and  Milton  belong  to  the  natural 
world,  those  seen  by  Paul  and  John  to  the  supernatural 
world.  The  substance  of  the  inspiration  in  the  one  case  is 
nature,  in  the  other  case  it  is  Christ.  Intercourse  with 
nature  had  fed  the  minds  of  Newton  and  Milton  with  the 
truth,  forming  the  material  upon  which  their  inspiration 
could  work.  Intercourse  with  Christ,  in  the  flesh  and  in 
the  spirit,  had  filled  the  minds  of  Paul  and  John  with  the 
material  on  which  their  inspiration  could  be  exercised. 
Christ  had  come  to  them  outwardly  and  inwardly,  and  this 
was  the  substance  of  their  inspiration. 

(6.)  The  inspiration  of  Newton  and  Milton  implies 
genius  ;  that  is,  a  special  faculty  in  each  individual.  This 
possession  of  genius,  or  special  faculty,  is  a  condition  sine  qua 
non  of  natural  inspiration.  It  is  solitary,  it  is  individual. 
But  the  inspiration  of  the  Avriters  of  the  New  Testament 
does  not  imply  genius.  Of  the  eight  writers  of  the  New 
Testament,  only  one,  viz.,  Paul,  appears  to  have  been  a  man 
of  natural  genius.  He  was  gi-eat  by  endowment,  the  others 
were  made  great  by  their  inspiration.  In  the  one  case  the 
uncommon  man  finds  wonderful  things  in  the  common  world  ; 
in  the  other  case  the  uncommon  world  shows  wonderful 
things  to  the  common  man. 

(c.)    Natural  and  supernatural  inspiration  dilFer  also  in 


106    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

their  occasion.  A  miraculous  event,  namely,  the  coming 
of  Chi'ist  iqwardly  to  their  souls  on  the  day  of  Pentecost, 
was  the  occasion  of  the  apostolic  inspiration.  This  coming 
of  the  Holy  Ghost  was  the  second  of  the  two  supernatural 
events  of  Christianity,  of  which  the  other  was  the  birth  of 
Christ.  The  miraculous  events  in  the  life  of  Jesus  may 
have  been  the  natural  results  of  the  coming  of  such  a  being 
into  the  world.  The  miracles  of  Christ's  life,  including 
his  resurrection,  may  have  been  natural  to  a  supernatural 
being.  They  are  the  evidence  of  a  break  in  the  series 
of  causation .  in  the  outward  world.  In  like  manner  the 
inward  coming  of  Christ  to  the  hearts  of  his  disciples  in 
what  is  called  the  influence  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  is  another 
supernatural  event,  the  natural  result  of  which  is  the  found- 
ing of  the  Church,  the  writing  of  the  New  Testament,  and 
the  newly  created  life  in  individual  souls. 

These  two  inspirations,  therefore,  differ  in  their  substance, 
source,  and  method.  The  substance  of  one  consists  of  truths 
of  the  natural  order,  the  other  of  the  supernatural  order. 
The  source  of  one  is  the  world  of  nature,  the  source  of  the 
other  is  the  inward  Christ.  And  the  method  of  the  one  is 
that  of  individual  genius,  Avhich  is  solitary,  while  the  method 
of  the  other  is  that  of  love  or  communion. 

§  6.  Inspimtion  of  the  Scriptures^  especially  of  the  New 
Testament  Scriptures.  —  We  now  pass  on  to  ask,  What  is  the 
inspiration  of  the  New  Testament,  or  of  its  writers  ? 

The  writers  of  the  New  Testament  had  no  different  in- 
spiration fi'om  that  of  all  other  Christians.  We  nowhere 
hear  of  any  one  receiving  an  inspiration  to  enable  him  to 
write  a  Gospel  or  an  Epistle.  They  distinctly  repel  the  idea 
of  any  such  special  or  distinct  inspiration.  "  By  one  spirit 
we  have  all  been  baptized  into  one  body,  and  have  been  all 
made  to  drink  into  one  spirit."  Gifts  are  different,  but  the 
spirit  is  one  and  the  same  in  all.  But  even  among  these 
diversities  of  gifts,  nothing  is  said  of  any  gift  for  writing 


ORTHODOX   IDEA    OF   THE   BIBLE.  107 

Gospels  or  Epistles.  Pi'obablj,  therefore,  the  inspiration 
by  which  these  were  written  was  precisely  the  same  as  that 
by  which  they  preached  to  the  Gentiles  or  taught  in  the 
Church.  It  was  an  innTird  sight  of  Christ,  an  inward  sight 
of  his  truth  and  love,  which  enabled  them  to  speak  and 
write  with  authority — the  authority  of  those  who  saw  Mhat 
they  said,  and  knew  it  to  be  true.  "  We  speak  what  we 
know,  and  testify  what  we  have  seen."  Hence  it  is  that  we 
iind  in  their  writings  so  much  substance,  so  much  compre- 
hensiveness, so  much  insight.  They  are  in  constant  com- 
munion with  an  invisible  world  of  truth.  They  describe 
what  is  before  their  eyes. 

A  book  given  by  inspiration  is  not  a  book  made  perfect 
by  miracle,  but  a  book,  the  writer  of  which  was  in  a  state 
open  to  influences  from  a  higher  sphere.  All  books  which 
the  human  race  has  accepted  as  inspired  —  Vedas,  Koran, 
Zendavesta  —  are  sacred  scriptures ;  all  that  lasts  is  in- 
spired. Perpetuity,  not  infallibility,  is  the  sign  of  inspira- 
tion. 

"  The  -word  unto  the  prophet  spoken 
Was  writ  on  tables  yet  unbroken; 
The  word  by  seers  or  sibyls  told 
In  groves  of  oak  or  fanes  of  gold 
Still  floats  upon  the  morning  wind,  ' 

Still  whispers  to  the  willing  mind. 
One  accent  of  the  Holy  Ghost 
The  heedless  world  has  never  lost." 

The  famous  proof-text  on  this  subject  is  that  in  the  Second 
Epistle  of  Paul  to  Timothy:  "All  Scripture  is  given  by 
inspiration  of  God,  and  is  profitable  for  doctrine,  reproof, 
correction,  and  instruction  in  righteousness."  To  what 
Scripture  did  Paul  refer?  Some  say  to  the  Jewish  Scrip- 
ure.  Some  say  to  the  Jewish  and  Christian  writings.  But 
the  Christian  writings  were  not  then  all  written,  and  were 
not  collected  into  what  we  call  the  New  Testament.  The 
apostle  does  not  limit  himself  to  these.  He  says,  '■^All 
Scripture   is    inspired "  —  not   merely   Jewish   or   Christian 


108     ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

Scripture,  but  all  sacred  writing.  All  the  writings  of  every 
age  which  jare  looked  upon  as  Scripture,  which  men  from 
age  to  age  reverence  and  honor  as  such,  were  not  of  man's 
invention,  not  of  man's  device,  but  came  from  some  irrepres- 
sible influence  acting  on  the  soul  from  within.  The  poet 
before  quoted  says  truly,  — 

"  Out  from  the  heart  of  nature  rolled 
The  burdens  of  the  Bible  old. 
The  litanies  of  nations  came, 
Like  the  volcano's  tongue  of  flame, 
Up  from  the  burning  cone  below, 
The  canticles  of  love  and  woe. 
The  hand  that  rounded  Peter's  dome, 
And  groined  the  aisles  of  Christian  Rome, 
Wrought  in  a  sad  sincerity. 
Himself  from  God  he  could  not  free; 
He  builded  better  than  he  knew  j 
The  conscious  stone  to  beauty  grew." 

There  is  a  truth  in  this  —  a  profound  truth.  The  Bible 
is  not  an  exceptional  book  in  this,  that  it  has  no  paral- 
lels in  nature  to  its  method  of  production.  It  is  true  that 
Phidias  was  inspired  to  make  his  statue  and  to  build  the 
Parthenon. 

"  Such  and  so  grew  these  holy  piles, 
While  love  and  terror  laid  the  tiles. 
Earth  proudly  wears  the  Parthenon 
As  the  best  gem  upon  her  zone, 
And  morning  opes  in  haste  her  lids 
To  gaze  upon  tlie  Pyramids; 
O'er  England's  abbeys  bends  the  sky- 
As  on  its  friends  with  kindred  eye; 
For  out  of  thought's  interior  sphere 
These  wonders  rose  to  upper  air." 

When  Mr.  Emerson  and  Theodore  Parker  compare  in 
tliis  way  the  Bible  with  the  Vedas  or  the  Parthenon,  we 
often  feel  that  it  degrades  the  Bible,  and  takes  away  its 
special  sanctity.  But  this  is  not  necessarily  the  case. 
There  may  be  a  wide  gulf  between  the  inspiration  of  the 
Bible  and  that  of  the  Vedas,  or  of  Homer  or  Plato ;  and 
yet  they  may  all  belong  to  the  same  class  of  works.     There 


ORTHODOX   IDEA    OF   THE   BIBLE.  109 

is  a  wide  gulf  between  man  and  the  highest  of  the  inferior 
animals  ;  and  yet  we  put  man  into  the  class  Mammalia, 
along  with  oxen,  whales,  and  cats,  and  into  the  same  Order 
with  apes  and  bats.  "NVc  do  not  think  that  man  is  degraded 
by  being  thus  classified.  He  occupies  a  distinct  species  in 
this  order  and  class.  So  the  New  Testament  and  Old 
Testament  constitute  two  distinct  species,  of  which  they  are 
the  sole  representatives  of  one  genus  of  inspired  books ; 
but  that  genus  belongs  to  the  same  order  as  the  Vedas, 
Edda,  Zendavesta,  and  Koran,  and  that  order  belongs  to 
the  same  class  as  the  poems  of  Homer  and  Dante,  the 
architecture  of  the  Parthenon  and  the  Strasburg  Minster, 
the  discovery  of  America  by  Columbus,  and  of  the  law  of 
gravitation  by  Newton. 

The  class  of  works  which  we  call  inspired  comprehends, 
as  we  have  before  said,  all  which  come  to  man  by  a  cer- 
tain influx  into  his  soul  —  not  by  looking  out  of  himself, 
but  by  looking  into  himself.  Sometimes  we  go  and 
search  and  find  thoughts  ;  sometimes  thoughts  come  and 
find  us.  "■  They  flash  upon  our  inner  eye  ;  "  they  haunt 
us,  and  pursue  us,  and  take  possession  of  us.  So  Columbus 
was  haunted  by  the  idea  of  a  continent  in  the  Avest ;  so 
Newton  was  haunted  by  his  discoveiy  long  before  he  made 
it;  so  the  "Paradise  Lost"  pursued  Milton  long- before  it 
was  written.  Every  really  great  work  must  have  in  it  more 
or  less  of  this  element  which  we  call  inspiration. 

But  while  the  great  works  of  genius  belong  to  the  class 
of  inspired  works,  we  make  a  distinct  order  out  of  the  great 
religious  works  which  have  been  the  sacred  Scriptures  of  races 
of  men.  They  evidently  came  from  a  higher  inspiration  than 
the  works  of  science  and  the  works  of  art.  They  have 
ruled  men's  souls  for  thousands  of  years.  These,  then,  we 
place  in  an  Order  by  themselves,  and  it  is  no  discredit  to  the 
Bible  to  be  ranked  with  the  works  of  Confucius,  which  have 
10 


110         orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

kept  the  Chinese  orderly,  peaceful,  industrious,  and  happy 
for  almost  twenty-six  centuries. 

But  still,  among  these  sacred  books  the  Bible  may  be  said 
to  constitute  a  distinct  genus,  because  it  differs  from  all  the 
rest  in  two  ways  —  in  teaching  the  holiness  of  God  and  the 
unity  of  God.  The  writer  has  been  a  cai-eful  reader  of  all 
these  sacred  books  for  twenty  years  ;  he  has  read  them  with 
respect ;  in  no  captious  spirit ;  wishing  to  find  in  them  all 
the  truth  he  could.  He  has  found  in  them  much  truth  — 
much  in  accordance  with  Christianity.  But  he  sees  a  wide 
difference  between  them  all  and  the  Bible.  They  are  all 
profitable  for  doctrine,  for  reproof,  for  instruction  ;  but  they 
are  not  Holy  Scriptures  in  the  sense  in  which  we  ascribe  that 
word  to  the  Bible.  The  Old  Testament,  though  having  in 
it  many  harsh  and  hard  features,  belonging  to  the  Jewish 
mind,  has  strains  which  rise  into  a  higher  region  than  any- 
thing in  the  Vedas  or  the  Zendavesta.  The  Proverbs  of 
Solomon  are  about  on  a  level  with  the  books  of  Con- 
fucius. But  nowhere  in  all  these  Ethnic  Scriptures  are 
strains  like  some  of  the  Psalms  —  like  passages  in  Isaiah 
and  Jeremiah.  The  laws  of  Menu  are  low  compared  with 
the  Pentateuch. 

But  if  the  Old  and  New  Testament  make  a  genus  by 
themselves,  they  divide  again  into  two  species.  There  is  a 
specific  difference  between  the  New  Testament  and  the  Old. 
The  New  Testament  inspiration  is  of  a  far  deeper,  higher, 
and  broader  character  than  the  other.  In  fact,  we  ought, 
perhaps,  to  make  a  special  order  by  itself  from  the  New 
Testament  writings.  They  are  so  full  of  life,  light,  and 
love  —  they  are  so  strong  yet  so  tender  —  so  pure  yet  so 
free.!  They  have  no  cant  of  piety,  no  formalism,  but  breathe 
throughout  a  heavenly  atmosphere.  Their  inspiration  is  of 
the  highest  kind  of  all. 

But  what  is  this  Holy  Spirit?  What  does  it  teach? 
Scientific  truth?     No.     Scientific  truth  has  been  taught  the 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OF   THE   BIBLE.  Ill 

world  by  other  channels.  Bacon  and  Newton,  La  Place  and 
Cuvier,  Linnteus  and  Dc  Candolle,  have  been  inspired  to 
teach  science.  Their  knowledge  came,  not  only  by  observa- 
tion, not  only  by  study,  but  by  patiently  opening  their  minds 
to  receive  impressions  from  above.  Were  the  writers  of 
the  Bible  inspired  to  teach  history?  We  think  not.  There 
are  histories  of  the  Jews  in  the  Bible,  and  they  are  likely  to 
be  as  authentic,  as  histories,  as  are  those  of  Herodotus  and 
Livy,  and  other  painstaking  and  sincere  historians.  But 
the  special  inspiration  of  the  Bible  does  not  appear  in  the 
historic  books. 

But  are  not  all  parts  of  the  Bible  equally  inspired  by  this 
Holy  Spirit?  By  no  means.  We  can  easily  see  that  they 
are  not.  It  is  evident  that  there  is  nothing  spiritually  edify- 
ing in  a  large  part  of  the  history  of  the  Old  Testament  — 
the  account  of  Samson,  the  story  of  Gideon,  large  parts  of 
the  books  of  Judges  and  Chronicles,  the  Song  of  Solomon, 
the  book  of  Esther.  The  book  of  Ecclesiastes  is  full, 
throughout,  of  a  dark  and  terrible  scepticism.  Now,  all 
these  books  are  valuable,  exceedingly  so,  as  history,  but  not 
as  proceeding  from  the  Holy  Spirit. 

But  it  may  be  said,  "  If  the  history  of  the  Bible  is  not  in- 
spired, it  may  be  erroneous."  Certainly  it  may.  We  have 
seen  that  the  account  of  creation  in  the  book  of  Genesis  is 
probably  erroneous.  It  contains  one  great  faith,  luminous 
throughout —  namely,  that  there  is  one  God,  Creator  of  all 
worlds  and  of  mankind.  But  as  to  the  order  of  creation,  — 
the  six  days,  the  garden  of  Eden,  —  all  we  can  say  is,  that 
there  may  be  some  way  by  which  Moses  could,  in  vision, 
have  seen  these  things,  represented  in  picture,  as  they  hap- 
pened long  before.  There  may  be  such  a  kind  of  unveiling 
of  the  past  before  the  inner  eye  of  the  soul.  We  do  not 
deny  it,  for  it  is  not  wise  to  deny  where  we  knoAV  nothing. 
But  we  can  assert  that  Christianity  does  not  require  us  to 
believe  those   chapters  of  Genesis   to  contain  historic  truth. 


112    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

It  may  be  allegorical  truth.  It  may  be  a  parable,  repre- 
senting how  every  little  child  comes  into  an  Eden  of  innocence, 
and  is  tempted  by  that  wily  serpent,  the  sophistical  under- 
standing, and  is  betrayed  by  desire,  his  Eve,  and  goes  out  of 
his  garden  of  childhood,  where  all  life  proceeds  spontaneously 
and  by  impulse,  into  a  world  of  work  and  labor.  If  it  be 
such  an  allegory  as  that,  it  teaches  us  quite  as  much  as  if  it 
were  history. 

§  7.  Authority  of  the  Scriptures.  —  We  have  seen  that 
the  Bible,  though  inspired,  is  not  infallible.  But,  it  is  said, 
unless  the  Bible  is  infallible  it  has  no  authority.  This  we 
deny.  Inspiration  is  not  infallibility,  but  inspiration  is 
authority.  The  inspired  man  is  always  an  authority. 
Phidias  and  Michael  Angelo  are  authorities  in  sculpture ; 
Titian  and  Rafaelle  are  authorities  in  painting ;  Mozart  and 
Beethoven   in   music ;    and  Paul,  John,  Peter,   in   religion. 

Authority  without  infallibility  is  the  problem  before  us. 
It  is  evident  tliat  authority  is  desirable  ;  it  is  equally  evident 
that  infallibility  is  impossible.  Can  there,  therefore,  be  the 
one  without  the  other?  Can  God  reveal  himself  to  man 
through  a  fallible  medium?  Can  the  writers  of  the  New 
Testament  be  so  inspired  as  to  be  able  to  communicate 
ti-uth,  and  yet  so  inspired  as  not  to  be  infallible?  To  all 
these  questions  we  answer,  Yes  ;  and  will  try  to  show  it  to 
be  so. 

Suppose  that  you  are  going  through  a  forest  in  company 
with  others.  You  have  lost  your  way.  No  one  knows 
which  way  to  go  ;  dangers  are  around  you  —  dangers  from 
cold,  hunger,  wild  beasts,  enemies.  If  you  go  the  wrong 
way,  you  may  all  perish  ;  if  you  go  the  right  way,  you  will 
rea?h  your  destination  and  be  safe.  Under  these  circum- 
stances,, one  of  the  party  climbs  a  tree,  and  when  he  has 
reached  tie  top  he  cries  out  with  joy,  "  I  see  the  way  we 
ought  to  go.  We  must  go-  to  the  right.  I  see  the  ocean  in 
that  direction,  and  the   spires  of  the  city   to  which  we  are 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OF   THE    BIBLE.  113 

bound."  You  all  immediately  go  the  way  that  he  directs. 
He  has  become  an  authority  to  you.  You  follow  his 
guidance  implicitly,  and  put  your  lives  into  his  hands,  de- 
pending upon  the  truth  of  what  he  says.  Why?  Because 
he  has  been  where  you  have  not  been,  and  has  seen  what 
you  have  not  seen,  and  you  believe  him  honest  and  true. 
He  has  no  motive  to  deceive  you.     This  is  his  authority. 

But  is  it  equivalent  to  infallibility?  By  no  means.  No 
one  supposes  him  to  be  infallible.  If,  after  following  his 
direction  for  a  while,  you  see  no  signs  to  show  that  you  are 
in  the  right  way,  you  begin  to  think  that  he  may  have  been 
mistaken,  and  some  one  else  climbs  a  tree  to  verify  his 
judgment,  or  to  correct  it.  But  if,  instead,  signs  begin  to 
appear  to  show  that  you  are  in  the  right  way,  your  faith 
in  yoiu'  guide  is  confirmed,  and  his  authority  is  practically 
increased. 

"What  gives  a  man  authority  as  a  guide,  teacher,  counsellor, 
is  not  our  belief  in  his  infallibility,  but  our  belief  in  his 
knowledge  ;  if  we  believe  that  he  knows  something  we  do 
not  know,  he  becomes  thereby  an  authority  to  us.  If  he  has 
been  where  we  have  not  been,  and  seen  what  we  have  not 
seen,  he  is  au  antliority.  A  man  who  has  just  come  from 
Europe  or  from  Ciilirornia,  who  has  been  in  the  midst  of  a 
great  battle,  who  has  studied  a  subject  Avhieh  others  have 
not  studied,  and  made  himself  familiar  with  it,  such  a  man  is 
an  authority  to  others.  Observe  men  listening  to  him.  All 
defer  to  him  while  he  is  speaking  on  this  subject.  He  may 
be  much  more  ignorant  than  they  are  in  regaid  to  other 
things,  but,  if  he  has  had  superior  opportunities  in  regard  to 
this  subject,  he  is  an  authority.  Yet  they  do  not  believe 
him  infallible  ;  for  if,  in  the  course  of  his  conversation,  he 
says  anything  which  seems  contradictory,  incredible,  absurd, 
they  begin  to  withdraw  their  confidence,  and  may  withdraw 
it. wholly.  But  if,  on  the  other  hand,  what  he  says  is  clear, 
10* 


114  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TROTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

consistent,  solid  with  information,  liis  authority  is  increased 
continually,  and  his  hearers  defer  to  him  more  and  more. 

Now,  the  authority  of  the  writers  of  the  New  Testament 
is  exactly  of  this  kind.  The  authority  of  inspiration  every- 
where is  of  this  kind.  An  inspired  man  is  one  who  is 
believed  to  have  been  where  we  have  not  been,  and  to  have 
seen  what  we  have  not  seen. 

In  Cooper's  novels  there  is  a  character  whom  he  calls 
Leatherstocking,  familiar  with  the  woods,  knowing  all  their 
signs,  acquainted  with  the  habits  of  bird,  beast,  and  Indian. 
He  guides  the  travellers  through  the  wilderness,  and,  by  his 
superior  knowledge,  saves  them  from  the  Indian  ambush  and 
the  pursuing  savage.  They  commit  themselves  implicitly  to 
his  guidance,  trust  their  lives  to  him.  Why  ?  Because  they 
confide  in  his  knowledge  of  woodcraft  and  in  his  fidelity.  As 
regards  all  matters  pertaining  to  the  forest,  he  is  an  author- 
ity ;  their  teacher  if  they  want  information,  their  guide  if 
they  are  ignorant  of  the  Avay,  their  saviour  in  imminent  peril 
from  savage  beasts  and  savage  men.  He  is  an  authority  to 
them,  a  perfect  authority  ;  for  they  confide  in  him  entirely, 
without  a  shade  of  doubt.  But  no  one  thinks  him  infallible, 
nor  supposes  it  necessary  to  believe  him  infallible,  in  order 
to  trust  him  entirely. 

Just  so  a  ship  on  a  lee  shore,  in  the  midst  of  a  driving 
storm,  throws  up  signal  rockets  or  fires  a  gun  for  a  pilot. 
A  white  sail  emerges  from  the  mist ;  it  is  the  pilot-boat.  A 
man  climbs  on  board,  and  the  captain  gives  to  him  the 
command  of  the  ship.  All  his  orders  are  obeyed  implicitly. 
The  ship,  laden  with  a  precious  cargo  and  hundreds  of  lives, 
is  confided  to  a  rough-looking  man  whom  no  one  ever  saw 
before,  who  is  to  guide  them  through  a  narrow  channel, 
whers  to  vary  a  few  fathoms  to  the  right  or  left  will  be  utter 
destruction.  The  pilot  is  invested  with  absolute  authority  as 
regards  bringing  the  vessel  into  port. 

When  Columbus  came  back  from  his  first  voyage,  and 


ORTHODOX   IDEA   OP   THE   BIBLE.  115 

reported  the  discovery  of  America,  was  he  not  an  authority  ? 
Did  not  men  throng  around  him,  to  hear  of  what  he  had 
seen  and  done?  Yet  who  believed  him  infollible.  He  wlio 
has  been  where  I  have  not  been,  and  seen  what  I  have  not 
Been,  is  an  authority  to  me.  If  I  believe  him  honest,  and 
no  impostor,  then  I  learn  from  him,  and  depend  on  his 
testimony.  Now,  the  writers  of  the  New  Testament  have 
been  where  we  have  not  been.  They  have  ascended  heights, 
and  sounded  depths  in  the  spiritual  world  unknown  to  us. 
So  they  are  authorities  to  us,  provided  we  have  enough  of 
their  spirit  in  us  to  enable  us  to  see  and  know  their  inspira- 
tion. For,  unless  I  have  some  musical  spirit  in  me,  I  cannot 
discern  the  inspiration  of  Mozart ;  unless  I  have  some  math- 
ematical spirit  in  me,  I  cannot  discern  the  mathematical 
inspiration  of  Newton  and  Kepler.  So  the  natural  man 
(the  man  who  has  nothing  in  him  corresponding  to  the 
Christian  inspiration)  cannot  discern  the  things  of  the  Spirit 
of  God ;  for  they  arc  foolishness  to  him,  for  they  are  spirit- 
ually discerned  or  judged.  He  lives  in  external  things,  as 
babes  do.  The  authority  of  the  Spirit  in  the  Bible  is  that 
it  awakens  and  appeals  to  whatever  spiritual  element  exists 
in  our  soul,  and  compels  it  to  feel  and  admit  its  truth. 

Jesus,  it  is  said,  in  giving  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount, 
taught  as  one  having  authority,  and  not  as  the  Scribes.  What 
was  his  authority,  then  ?  Not  official  authority,  for  he  was 
not  yet  known  to  be  the  Christ,  hardly  yet  known  to  be  a 
prophet.  Not  merely  the  authority  coming  from  an  imposing 
manner ;  not  an  authoritative  air,  or  tone,  or  manner,  cer- 
tainly. That  was  precisely  the  tone  and  manner  which  the 
Scribes  did  have  in  their  teaching.  But  the  authority  is  in 
the  Sermon  itself.  Its  truths  are  so  wonderfully  distinct  and 
self-evident,  they  carry  conviction  with  them.  Jesus  sees  so 
plainly  all  that  he  says  —  there  is  no  hesitation,  no  obscui'ity, 
no  perhapses  in  his  language.  He  is  like  one  describing 
what  is  before  his  eyes,  what  he  knows  to  be  true  because  ho 


116         orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

sees  it  while  he  is  saying  it.  It  is,  in  short,  the  authority 
which  always  attends  knowledge.  He  who  knows  anything, 
and  can  speak  with  certainty,  carries  conviction  with  him, 
though  we  do  not  suppose  him  to  be  infallible,  nor  is  it  thought 
necessary  to  believe  him  so,  in  order  to  give  to  him  this 
authority. 

By  such  examples,  we  see  that  in  earthly  matters  of  the 
very  highest  importance  we  ascribe  authority  without  sup- 
posing infallibility.  Now,  if  we  analyze  the  source  of  this 
authority,  we  shall  find  that  it  comes,  first,  from  the  testi- 
mony of  others,  and,  secondly,  from  our  own  experience. 
Leatherstocking  comes  recommended  to  the  travellers  as  a 
skilful  and  faithful  guide,  and  they  trust  him,  at  first,  on  the 
simple  ground  of  that  recommendation.  But  they  do  not 
trust  him  entirely  or  fully  on  that  ground.  They  watch  him 
while  they  trust  him,  —  perhaps  we  ought  rather  to  say,  they 
try  him,  than  that  they  trust  him.  But,  after  they  have  tried 
him  day  by  day,  week  by  week,  and  find  him  always  skilful, 
always  faithful,  they  come  to  place  a  more  and  more  implicit 
trust  in  his  guidance  ;  he  becomes  more  and  more  an  au- 
thority. 

So  the  pilot  comes  at  first  recommended  only  by  his  office. 
His  office  implies  the  testimony  of  those  who  ought  to  know 
that  he  is  able  to  guide  the  vessel  into  the  harbor.  But  if, 
besides  this,  there  is  some  one  on  board  who  knows  his  ability 
and  fidelity  by  previous  experience,  and  says,  "  We  are  all 
safe  now  ;  this  is  the  famous  John  Smith  or  "William  Brown, 
the  best  pilot  in  the  harbor,"  then  everybody  is  ready  to 
trust  him  more  entirely. 

Knowledge  and  fidelity,  not  infallibility,  these  make  a  man. 
an  authority  to  others  in  things  pertaining  to  this  life — • 
knowledge  and  fidelity,  evidenced  to  us,  first  by  the  testi- 
mony of  others,  and  secondly  by  our  own  experience.  Tes- 
timony leads  us  to  try  a  man  and  trust  him  partially,  trust 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OF   THE   BIBLE.  117 

hira,  but  watch  him.  Add  to  this  our  own  experience  of  his 
knowledge  and  fidelity,  and  we  trust  him  Avholly. 

There  are  two  worlds  of  knowledge  —  outward  and  in- 
ward. Knowledge  of  the  outward  world  comes  to  us 
through  the  senses,  by  observation  ;  knowledge  of  the  in- 
ward world  comes  to  us  through  the  consciousness,  by 
insight  or  inspire  :ion.  Every  man's  knowledge  has  come  to 
him  by  both  of  these  methods.  The  soul  has  a  perceptive 
power  with  Avhich  it  can  look  cither  way.  It  looks  outward 
through  the  senses,  and  perceives  an  external  world  ;  it  looks 
inward  through  the  consciousness,  and  perceives  an  internal 
world.  It  looks  outward,  and  perceives  forms,  hears  sounds, 
becomes  acquainted  with  external  nature.  It  looks  inward, 
and  becomes  acquainted  with  justice,  holiness,  love,  freedom, 
duty,  sin,  immortality,  the  infinite,  the  eternal,  God. 

But  just  as  it  depends  on  various  conditions  as  to  what 
a  man  shall  see  through  the  senses  in  time  and  space,  so 
it  depends  on  other  conditions  as  to  what  a  man  shall  see 
beyond  time  and  space  in  the  spiritual  world.  The  condi- 
tions in  the  first  instance  are,  good  pei'ceptive  organs,  a 
genius  for  observation,  educated  powers  for  observation, 
knowledge  of  what  to  observe,  and  finally  opportunities  for 
observation,  or  being  able  to  go  where  the  things  are  which 
are  to  be  seen.  A  blind  man  standing  in  front  of'  the  Par- 
thenon would  be  no  authority  to  us  as  to  its  architecture ; 
neither  would  the  most  sharp-sighted  person  who  should 
happen  to  be  in  America,  instead  of  Greece.  So  an  Indian, 
with  the  finest  perceptive  faculty,  and  standing  directly  in 
front  of  this  majestic  temple,  would  give  a  very  poor  account 
of  it,  from  want  of  previous  knowledge.  He,  only,  would  be 
an  authority  to  us  in  regard  to  such  a  building,  who  should 
combine  with  good  perceptive  organs,  and  some  knowledge 
of  the  subject,  an  opportunity  for  looking  at  it. 

When  we  speak  of  inspiration,  we  mean,  in  regard  to 
the  inward  world,  exactly  the  same  thing.     We  mean  that  a 


118     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

man  has  his  spiritual  organs  in  a  healthy  condition,  that  he 
has  some  knowledge  of  spiritual  things,  and  that  he  has  been 
placed  by  divine  Providence  where  he  is  able  to  see  them. 
Some  men  are  lifted  into  a  world  of  spiritual  perception, 
when  they  see  things  not  seen  by  other  men.  They  become 
prophets,  apostles,  lawgivers  to  the  human  race.  They  are 
invested  with  authority.  Men  believe  what  they  say,  and  do 
what  they  command,  and  put  their  souls  into  their  hands, 
just  as  they  trust  their  bodies  to  the  guide  of  the  pilot. 

These  are  the  inspired  men  —  the  men  to  whom  revelations 
have  been  made.  They  have  authority,  because  they  have 
been  where  we  have  not  been,  and  seen  what  we  have  not 
seen.  But  they  have  not  infallibility,  because,  as  the  apostle 
says,  they  have  this  treasure  in  earthen  vessels.  This  divine 
knowledge  is  contained  in  a  finite,  and  therefore  fallible  mind. 
But  we  see  by  means  of  our  former  illustrations  that  to  grant 
their  fallibility  does  not  detract  at  all  from  their  authority. 

And  again,  their  authority  is  certified  to  us  exactly  as  in 
the  other  instances.  They  come  recommended  by  external 
testimony,  and  on  the  strength  of  that  testimony  we  confide 
in  them  and  try  them.  If  we  find  that  they  are  not  able  to 
teach  us,  they  cease  to  be  authorities  to  us.  But  if  we  find 
that  they  are  full  of  truth,  they  become  our  guides  and  teach- 
ers, and  their  authority  is  more  and  more  confirmed  ;  that 
they  are  good  and  true  guides,  is  evidenced  by  their  being 
able  to  guide  us.  They  lead  us  into  deeper  depths  of  truth 
and  love.  They  become  the  teachers  of  their  race.  The 
centuries  which  pass  add  more  and  more  weight  to  their 
authority.  They  inspire  us,  therefore  they  are  themselves 
inspired.  It  is  no  more  necessary,  after  this,  to  prove  their 
inspiration,  in  the  sense  which  I  have  given,  than  to  prove 
that  the  sun  shines. 

One  remarkable  illustration  of  this  process,  by  which  the 
test  of  Scripture,  as  inspired,  is  that  it  should  be  profitable  for 
doctrine,  reproof,  and  instruction,  is  to  be  found  iu  the  Epistle 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OF    THE    BIBLE.  119 

of  Baruabas.  Barnabas  introduced  Paul  to  the  apostles  at 
Jerusalem,  and  is  called,  in  the  book  of  Acts,  a  good  tnau,  and 
full  of  the  Holy  Ghost.  He  was  sent  on  a  mission  to  An- 
tioch  by  the  apostles ;  afterwards  Avas  specially  pointed  out 
by  the  Holy  Ghost  to  go  with  Paul  on  his  mission.  (Acts  13  : 
2.)  He  is  styled  a  prophet  in  this  place,  and  we  read  that 
the  Holy  Spirit  said,  "  Separate  me  Barnabas  and  Saul  for 
the  work  whereunto  I  have  called  them." 

During  this  mission  Barnabas  seems  to  have  been  the 
more  important  of  the  two,  for  at  Lystra  the  people  called 
him  Jupiter,  and  Paul  Mercury.  Barnabas  and  Paul  ap- 
peared before  the  first  council  at  Jerusalem ;  and  the 
apostles,  in  their  letter,  say,  "  Our  beloved  Barnabas,  and  a 
man  that  has  hazarded  his  lif^  for  the  name  of  the  Lord 
Jesus."  Now,  tliis  Barnabas,  called  an  apostle  in  the  book 
of  Acts,  companion  of  Paul,  sent  on  a  mission  by  the  Holy 
Spirit,  and  commended  by  the  apostles  at  Jerusalem,  was  be- 
lieved by  the  early  Church  to  have  written  an  Epistle.  It  is 
quoted  as  his,  seven  times  by  Clement  of  Alexandria,  in  the 
second  century,  three  times  by  Origen,  and  by  other  writers. 

Accordingly,  it  was  originally  included  in  the  New  Testa- 
ment, and  for  nearly  four  hundred  years  made  a  part  of  it. 
The  oldest  manuscript  of  the  New  Testament  in  the  Avorld, 
supposed  to  have  been  Avritteu  in  the  fourth  century,  contains 
the  Epistle  of  Barnabas  ;  and  one'  reason  for  believing  the 
manuscript  so  old,  is  that  it  does  contain  it.  This  manuscript 
was  found  by  the  celebrated  German  critic  Tischendorf,  in 
18j9,  in  the  convent  of  St.  Catharine,  at  Mount  Sinai. 
Why,  then,  is  not  this  Epistle  of  Barnabas  printed  in  our 
New  Testa,ment?  Whoever  reads  it  will  easily  see  the  rea- 
son. It  is  because  it  does  not  deserve  to  be  there  ;  it  does 
not  have  the  marks  of  a  high  inspiration  ;  it  is  made  up  in 
a  great  degree  of  quotations  from  the  Old  Testament,  of  im- 
itations of  St.  Paul,  and  of  allegories.  It  evidently  dropped 
out  of  the  Bible  by  its  own  weight.     It  had  every  opportu- 


120  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND    ERRORS. 

nity  offered  it  to  become  a  part  of  sacred  Scripture  ;  but 
being  tried  by  Paul's  test,  it  was  found  not  to  be  profitable  for 
doctrine,  reproof,  or  anything  else,  and  so  the  copyists  saved 
their  time,  labor,  and  vellum  by  leaving  it  out.  It  was  re- 
ceived on  testimony,  and  discarded  after  experience.  It  had 
authority  at  first,  because  of  its  supposed  author ;  it  lost  it 
afterwards,  by  means  of  its  empty  self. 

This,  then,  is  the  authority  of  the  writers  of  the  Bible.  It 
is  the  authority  of  inspired  men  —  men  who  have  been  into 
spiritual  regions  where  most  men  have  not  gone,  and  seen 
what  most  men  have  not  seen.  It  is  not  infallibility.  They 
are  capable  of  mistakes  and  error.  Their  being  in  the  Bible 
is  only  so  far  a  proof  that  they  are  inspired,  as  it  gives  the 
testimony  of  the  Church  that  it  has  found  the  proofs  of  in- 
spiration in  their  writings.  The  Christian  community  has 
followed  the  apostolic  direction,  and  tried  the  spirits  whether 
they  Avere  of  God  or  not,  and  has  come  to  the  conclusion 
that  these  New  Testament  writers  have  the  marks  of  inspira- 
tion. For  you  will  observe  that  the  present  code  of  the  New 
Testament  was  gradually  formed,  and  that  not  by  the  votes 
of  councils  or  the  decisions  of  bishops,  but  by  the  feelings  of 
the  Christian  community.  An  inward  instinct,  and  no  exter- 
nal authority,  presided  over  the  collection  of  the  Scriptures, 
gradually  dropping  out  some  books  (like  Barnabas,  Hermas, 
and  the  Revelation  of  Petfer),  and  taking  in  others. 

So  the  Christian  Church  says  to  us,  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment, "  Here  is  a  book  concerning  which  we  testify  that  the 
writings  in  it  are  profitable  for  doctrine ;  that  its  writers 
have  superior  knowledge  in  regard  to  spiritual  things ;  that 
they  are  inspired  men,  who  have  been  taken  up  into  a  region 
where  most  men  have  never  gone,  and  seen  what  most  men 
have  never  seen,  and  therefore  hnow  more  than  most  of  us 
about  spiritual  truth." 

But  you  may  say,  "  If  inspiration  gives  knowledge,  and 
these  writers  are  inspired,  then  they  do  more  than  believe  or 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OF   THE    BIBLE.  121 

think  what  they  say  about  God,  duty,  and  immortality. 
They  Tcnoio ;  and  if  they  know,  does  not  that  mean  that  they 
are  infallible?  No,  knowledge  is  not  infallibility.  It  is 
true  that  inspiration  gives  knowledge,  while  speculation  only 
gives  opinion.  This  is  the  reason  why  inspired  men  speak 
with  authority,  and  philosophers  without  it.  But  knowledge, 
though  it  gives  authority,  does  not  give  infallibility. 

A  Frenchman  knows  the  French  language  ;  still  he  may 
make  mistakes  in  speaking  it.  The  man  from  California 
knows  that  country,  but  he  may  be  mistaken  about  it.  Thus, 
if  these  writers  are  not  iufollible,  they  may  make  mistakes ; 
and  if  so,  how  are  we  to  distinguish  between  their  truth  and 
their  error  ?     This  is  a  fair  question  :  let  us  try  to  answer  it. 

Let  us  return  to  our  former  comparison  of  travellers  and 
their  guide.  How  are  you  to  distinguish  between  your 
guide's  knowledge  and  his  errors  ? 

Probably,  when  your  guide  begins  to  be  uncertain  as  to 
the  way,  he  will  show  his  uncertainty  in  his  behavior.  He 
will  become  doubtful,  hesitating,  undecided  ;  he  will,  by  and 
by,  supposing  him  honest,  begin  to  express  his  uncertainty, 
and  say,  "  I  am  not  quite  sure  of  this  path." 

It  is  just  so  with  inspired  writers.  While  their  inspiration 
runs  in  a  full  tide,  they  speak  confidently  ;  they  are  distinct 
in  their  statements. 

Again,  if  your  guide  begins  to  speak  of  things  outside  of 
his  province,  he  does  not  carry  much  authority.  If  Leather- 
stocking  discusses  Shakespeare,  or  the  pilot  begins  to  talk 
about  politics,  his  opinions  carry  no  weight  except  what  is 
inherent  to  them. 

So  when  the  writers  of  the  Bible,  leaving  themes  of  reli- 
gion and  morals,  describe  natural  objects,  as  the  leviathan 
or  behemoth,  we  give  no  more  credit  to  their  descriptions 
than  we  should  to  those  of  any  other  writer  of  their  day. 

A  question  would  arise  here  whether  history  was  a  sub- 
ject of  inspiration  or  not ;  that  is,  whether  an  inspired  writer, 
11 


122     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

when  he  comes  to  speak  of  historic  facts,  has  any  more  au- 
thority than  another.  There  may  be  some  Avay  by  which 
past  events  might  be  presented  by  inspiration  to  the  mind  of 
one  caught  up  by  the  spirit  into  another  world.  But  the 
writers  of  the  Old  and  New  Testament  are  careless  about 
dates  and  numbers,  and  do  not  seem  to  be  made  accurate  by 
any  special  gift.  I  should,  therefore,  incline  to  the  opinion 
that  the  historic  books  of  the  Bible  have  no  authority  except 
tliat  of  their  reasonableness  and  conformity  to  what  we 
might  believe  on  other  grounds.  As  fragments  of  history, 
coming  from  so  remote  a  past,  they  are  invaluable,  when  we 
treat  them  as  simple,  honest  records  of  what  was  then  be- 
lieved or  known. 

Take,  for  instance,  the  story  of  the  deluge,  and  compare  it 
with  similar  stories  in  other  mythologies.  We  find  it  so 
corroborated  by  these,  that  we  may  believe  that  there  is  a 
basis  of  reality  in  it. 

§  8.  The  Christian  Prepossession.  —  It  is  a  great  thing  to 
read  a  book  with  expectation  instead  of  distrust.  Expecta- 
tion opens  the  mind  to  light,  and  makes  it  easy  to  see.  Dis- 
ti'ust  closes  it.  If  I  have  read  Shakespeare  till  I  feel  sure  of 
his  poetic  inspiration,  then  I  read  with  expectation  all  he 
writes  ;  I  am  looking  for  truth  and  beauty,  and  so  I  find  it. 
If  I  had  never  read  Shakespeare,  nor  heard  of  him,  and  Ham- 
let were  put  into  my  hand,  I  should  probably  be  displeased 
with  something  or  other,  and  throw  it  aside,  and  so  lose  the 
deepness  and  loveliness  of  that  wonderful  creation.  How 
much  we  find  in  the  words  of  Jesus  and  Paul,  because  wo 
read  them  with  expectation  and  hope !  because  we  read 
them  always  looking  for  what  is  deep  and  high ! 

Nevertheless  many  persons  recommend  a  contrary  course. 
They  say  that  we  ought  to  forget  all  that  has  been  told  us 
about  the  Book,  and  read  it  as  if  we  had  never  seen  it  before. 
But  this  method  is  neither  practicable  nor  desirable.  It  is 
impossible  to  look  at  the  Bible  as  though  it  were  an  un- 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OF   THE    BIBLE.  123 

known  book ;  impossible  to  forget  that  it  is  the  text  book  of 
Christianity ;  regarded  as  sacred  by  millions  of  our  fellow- 
men  ;  the  source  of  spiritual  and  moral  life  to  the  Avorld  for 
the  last  fifteen  hundred  years ;  that  our  parents  and  friends 
have  found  in  it  strength  for  duty,  comfort  in  trial,  hope  in 
the  hour  of  death.  You  might  as  well  tell  the  child  who  be- 
gins to  study  geography  to  forget  that  he  lives  in  America, 
or  when  he  studies  the  history  of  the  United  States,  to  forget 
that  it  is  the  history  of  his  own  land.  Nor  would  it  be  de- 
sirable to  study  the  New  Testament  thus.  For  it  is  this 
grand  belief  concerning  it  which  makes  us  desire  to  study  it 
at  all.  Were  it  not  for  this  belief  it  might  be  occasionally 
read  by  a  student  in  the  interest  of  science,  but  never  by  the 
mass  of  the  community.  Faith  in  its  divine  origin  and  di- 
vine purpose,  causes  it  to  be  read  in  families,  schools, 
churches,  to  be  used  as  a  manual  of  prayer  in  the  closet, 
and  to  grow  familiar  in  every  home.  The  Book  is  sur- 
rounded by  a  traditional  halo  of  wonder,  reverence,  and 
hope,  and  this  gives  us  motive  and  power  with  which  to 
read  it.  If  a  cold  criticism,  a  sceptical  spirit,  shall  ever 
succeed  in  causing  the  New  Testament  to  be  regarded  as  a 
common  book,  on  the  natural  plane  of  human  thought,  full 
of  errors  and  imperfections,  inspired  only  as  Plato  is  in- 
spired, then  it  will  be  read  as  Plato  is  read,  that  is,  by  one 
man  in  a  million.  It  is  not  desirable  to  lose  the  reverence 
which  causes  us  to  expect  extraordinary  truth  and  good  in 
certain  books,  men,  and  institutions  ;  for  so  we  lose  the  best 
motive  power  of  the  soul ;  so  life  becomes  tame,  tire  day 
empty,  and  events  unmeaning. 

It  is,  therefore,  perfectly  right  for  the  Church  to  surroimd 
Christ  and  Christianity  with  this  divine  aureola  of  reverence 
and  wonder,  not  exaggerating  it,  but  neither  understating  it. 
For  this  wonder  and  reverence,  when  legitimate,  is  a  great 
treasure  of  spiritual  life,  animating  and  elevating,  which  the 
Church  possesses  in  order  that  it  may  communicate  it.     It 


124         orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

is  continually  proclaiming  its  good  news  ;  constantly  asserting 
that  through  Christ  God  has  given  it  a  divine  peace  ;  that  in 
Clirist  there  is  a  marvellous  truth  and  beauty  ;  and  that  the 
Gospels  and  Epistles,  which  contain  his  life  and  truth,  have  a 
strange  power  of  raising  us  above  ourselves,  and  bringing  us 
into  communion  with  an  eternal  world.  When  this  is  said, 
aot  by  rote,  or  as  a  mere  form,  but  from  sincere  conviction, 
the  spirit  of  faith  creates  faith,  and  faith  is  the  great  motive 
which  leads  to  action. 

As  it  is  the  duty  of  the  Church  to  excite  our  interest  in 
the  New  Testament,  by  declaring  its  own  love  and  respect 
for  it,  so  it  is  right  for  the  student  of  the  New  Testament 
to  give  a  certain  preliminary  weight  to  this  testimony  of  the 
Church  in  commencing  his  study.  This  is  what  we  call  the 
Christian  prepossession.  And  it  regards  the  New  Testament 
exactly  as  when  a  friend  whose  judgment  we  respect  ear- 
nestly recommends  to  us  some  book  which  he  has  read,  and 
which  has  done  him  good.  He  recommends  it  to  us  as  a 
good  book,  and  he  recommends  it  with  enthusiasm.  His 
enthusiasm  produces  in  us  a  desire  to  become  acquainted 
with  the  book,  and  a  certain  hope  that  we  shall  find  in  it 
what  our  friend  has  found.  This  hope  leads  on  towards  fru- 
ition, and  is  one  of  its  conditions.  It  ought  not,  therefore, 
to  "be  relinquished ;  but  neither  should  it  lead  us  to  accept 
blindly  everything  which  we  are  told.  We  must  look  with 
our  own  eyes,  think  with  our  own  mind,  feel  with  our  own 
heart. 

To  wish  to  come  to  the  study  of  the  Bible  without  pre- 
possession in  its  favor  is,  therefore,  a  foolish  wish ;  for, 
without  prepossession  in  its  favor,  we  should  have  little 
motive  for  studying  it  at  all.  It  is  our  faith  in  the  Bible 
that  leads  us  to  read  it ;  and  faith  here,  as  everywhere, 
is  the  motive  power  which  reason  has  only  to  guide  and 
restrain.  Faith  is  the  brave  steed  which  carries  us  forward, 
full  of  fire  and  full  of  pride.     Reason  is  the  bridle  by  which 


ORTHODOX   IDEA    OF  THE    BIBLE.  125 

he  is  guided,  supported,  and  restrained.  There  is  a  story 
of  a  thief  so  skilful  that  he  could  steal  a  man's  horse  from 
under  him  without  his  knowing  it,  and  so  leave  iiim  holding 
the  bridle  in  his  hand,  and  supposing  himself  to  be  still  ou 
horseback.  So  are  those  deceived  who  think  to  live  by 
reason  without  faith.  The  motive  power  of  their  life  has 
been  taken  away  from  them,  and  they  do  not  know  it ;  they 
suppose  that  they  can  ride  with  a  bridle  and  saddle,  without 
a  horse. 

To  read  the  New  Testament  to  any  purpose,  we  must, 
therefore,  read  with  the  faith  that  there  is  some  great  good 
to  be  got  from  it.  But  what  is  the  true  foundation  of  this 
faith?  Is  it  legitimate,  or  is  it  an  illusion?  The  basis  of 
this  faith  is  to  be  found  in  the  fact  that  the  Bible  has  done 
so  much,  and  is  doing  so  much,  for  the  world  —  a  fact  which 
cannot  be  stated  better  than  in  these  words  of  one  who  is  not 
commonly  supposed  to  have  too  high  a  reverence  for  the 
Bible :  — 

"  This  collection  of  books  has  taken  such  a  hold  on  the 
world  as  no  other.  The  literature  of  Greece,  which  goes 
up  like  incense  from  that  land  of  temples  and  heroic  deeds, 
has  not  half  the  influence  of  this  book  from  a  nation  alike 
despised  in  ancient  and  modern  times.  It  is  read  of  a  Sab- 
bath in  all  the  ten  thousand  pulpits  of  our  land.  •  In  all  the 
temples  of  Christendom  is  its  voice  lifted  up  week  by  week. 
The  sun  never  sets  on  its  gleaming  page.  It  goes  jequally  to 
the  cottage  of  the  plain  man  and  the  palace  of  the  king.  It 
is  woven  into  the  literature  of  the  scholar,  and  colors  the 
talk  of  the  street.  The  bark  of  the  merchant  cannot  sail 
the  sea  without  it,  no  ship  of  war  go  to  the  conflict  but  the 
Bible  is  there.  It  enters  men's  closets  ;  mingles  in  all  the 
grief  and  cheerfulness  of  life.  The  aflSanced  maiden  prays 
God  in  Scripture  for  strength  in  her  new  duties  ;  men  are 
married  by  Scripture.  The  Bible  attends  them  in  their  sick- 
ness ;  when  the  fever  of  the  world  is  on  them.  The  aching 
11* 


126    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

head  finds  a  softer  pillow  when  the  Bible  lies  underneath. 
The  mariner,  escaping  from  shipwreck,  clutches  this  first  of 
his  treasures,  and  keeps  it  sacred  to  God.  It  goes  with  the 
pedler  in  his  crowded  pack ;  cheers  him  at  eventide,  when 
he  sits  down  dusty  and  fatigued  ;  brightens  the  freshness  of 
his  morning  face.  It  blesses  us  when  we  are  born  ;  gives 
names  to  half  Christendom  ;  rejoices  with  us  ;  has  sympathy 
for  our  mourning ;  tempers  our  grief  to  finer  issues.  It  is 
the  better  part  of  our  sermons.  It  lifts  man  above  himself; 
our  best  of  uttered  prayers  are  in  its  storied  speech,  where- 
with our  fathers  and  the  patriarchs  prayed.  The  timid  man, 
about  awaking  from  this  dream  of  life,  looks  through  the 
glass  of  Scripture,  and  his  eye  grows  bright ;  he  does  not 
fear  to  stand  alone,  to  tread  the  way  unknown  and  distant, 
to  take  the  death-angel  by  the  hand,  and  bid  farewell  to  wife, 
and  babes,  and  home.  Men  rest  on  this  their  dearest  hopes. 
It  tells  them  of  God,  and  of  his  blessed  Son ;  of  earthly 
duties  and  of  heavenly  rest.  Foolish  men  find  it  the  source 
of  Plato's  wisdom,  and  the  science  of  Newton,  and  the  art 
of  Raphael.  Men  who  believe  nothing  else  that  is  spiritual 
believe  the  Bible  all  through  ;  without  this  they  would  not 
confess,  say  they,  even  that  there  was  a  God."  —  Theodore 
Parker^  Discourse  of  Religion. 

A  book  which  exercises  this  great  influence  over  our 
fellow-men  ought  to  be  approached  with  reverence.  It  is 
for  the  same  reason  that  we  approach  with  faith  and  expec- 
tation the  writings  of  Shakespeare  and  Milton.  We  read 
them  expecting  to  find  in  them  great  truths,  and  this  expec- 
tation enables  us  to  find  them.  "  Seek  and  ye  shall  find"  is 
the  law.  How  often  Ave  should  have  been  disappointed  and 
dissatisfied  with  such  books,  and  have  thrown  them  aside 
impatiently,  had  we  not  remembered  the  great  universal 
testimony  to  their  surpassing  excellence ! 

This  Christian  prepossession  is,  however,  only  a  general 
confidence  that  there  is  something  exceedingly  good  in  the 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OF   THE   BIBLE.  127 

New  Testament ;  that  it  is  a  book  containing  in  some  way  a 
divine  revelation,  in  some  way  or  other  inspired,  in  some 
way  likely  to  be  a  great  help  and  comfort  to  our  spiritual 
nature,  and  the  best  guide  Ave  can  have  for  this  life  and 
towards  the  next.  It  is  an  expectation  of  all  this,  an  expec- 
tation based  on  the  testimony  of  mankind.  So  far  it  is  a 
reasonable  expectation.  So  far  it  is  right  and  just  to  enter- 
tain it.  It  is  the  natural  inheritance  to  which  we  were  born, 
by  being  born  Christians.  To  throw  it  away,  or  to  try  to 
throw  it  away,  would  be  as  though  one  should  try  to  throw 
away  the  habits  of  civilization  which  he  inherits  by  being 
born  in  a  civilized  community,  and  try  to  go  back  and  start 
as  a  savage.  It  is  neither  more  futile  nor  more  foolish  in 
the  one  case  than  in  the  other. 

But,  though  this  Christian  prepossession  is  a  perfectly 
legitimate  one  with  which  to  begin,  it  is  not  a  legitimate 
one  in  which  to  remain.  It  is  our  business,  by  the  free 
action  of  our  intellect,  to  change  this  general  and  vague 
expectation  into  a  distinct  opinion  of  one  kind  or  another. 
Protestantism  allows  us  to  take  our  faith  in  the  Bible  from 
the  Church,  but  not  to  take  from  the  Church  our  opinions 
about  the  Bible.  Faith  may,  and  ought  to  be,  received,  but 
opinions  are  to  be  formed.  An  opinion  or  belief  received 
from  another  man  is  his  opinion,  and  not  ours. 

With  regard  to  any  other  book  this  would  be  self-evident. 
For  example,  suppose  that  I  have  never  read  the  play  of 
Hamlet.  I  hear  it  universally  spoken  of  as  one  of  the 
greatest  works  of  the  human  intellect.  That  naturally  and 
properly  creates  in  my  mind  the  expectation  of  finding  it  so. 
It  produces  the  general  belief  that  it  is  a  great  woi'k  of 
genius.  But  suppose  that,  besides  this  general  expectation, 
I  should  also  accept  from  my  neighbors  their  particular 
opinions  concerning  the  play.  I  hear  them  say  that  it  is 
more  philosophical,  but  less  dramatic,  than  Macbeth  ;  that 
the  character  of  Hamlet  is  overcharged  with  intellect,  and 


128  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

the  like.  If,  now,  I  adopt  and  repeat  these  opinions,  with- 
out having,  read  the  phiy,  it  is  evident  that  I  am  only  a  par- 
rot or  an  echo.  It  is  evident  that  they  are  not  my  opinions 
at  all,  and  that  they  indeed  interfere  with  my  having  any 
opinions.  Fifty  thousand  echoes  of  a  voice  leave  us  only 
one  voice  and  fifty  thousand  echoes. 

This  distinction  between  faith  and  opinion,  which  we  have 
already  spoken  of,  is  of  the  utmost  practical  importance. 
T^e  may  add  here  that,  for  want  of  it,  intellectual  people  try 
to  go  to  the  study  of  the  Bible  without  faith  in  the  Bible, 
and  religious  people  think  they  must  accept  all  their  opinions 
from  others,  and  take  them  in  ready  made.  It  is  not  abso- 
lutely essential  to  have  opinions  ;  but  if  we  do  have  them, 
they  ought  to  be  our  own.  Faith  must  be  received,  opinions 
must  be  formed. 

All  persons,  therefore,  ought  to  form  opinions  for  them- 
selves about  the  New  Testament.  They  may  bring  to  the 
work  a  faith  in  the  New  Testament,  as  being  in  some  sense 
or  other  a  revelation,  as  being  written  in  some  way  or  other 
by  inspired  men,  as  being  somehow  or  other  a  holy  book, 
the  legitimate  source  of  spiritual  life,  moral  goodness,  and 
inward  peace. 

§  9.  Conclusion.  —  If  the  views  given  in  this  chapter  are 
reasonable,  we  shall  conclude  that  Orthodoxy  is  right  in 
maintaining  the  supreme  excellence  and  vahie  of  the  Chris- 
tian Scriptures,  but  wrong  in  claiming  for  them  infallible 
accuracy.  It  is  right  in  saying  that  they  are  written  by 
inspired  men,  but  wrong  in  considering  this  inspiration  a 
guarantee  against  all  possible  error  or  mistake.  It  is  right 
in  calling  the  Bible  "  The  Holy  Scripture,"  but  wrong  in 
denying  to  the  scriptures  of  other  religions  some  divine  influx 
and  some  religious  life.  It  is  right  in  asking  that  the  Bible 
be  read  with  faith  and  expectation  ;  wrong  in  demanding 
for  it  unreasoning,  uncritical  submission.  Let  reverence  for 
its  spirit  and  criticism  of  its  letter  go  hand  in  hand  ;  for 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OF   THE    BIBLE.  129 

reverence  and  criticism,  faith  and  reason,  docility  to  great 
masters  and  freedom  in  seeking  for  ourselves,  are  antagonist, 
indeed,  but  not  contradictory.  They  are  not  hostile,  but 
helpful,  though  acting  in  opposite  directions  —  like  the  oppo- 
sition of  the  thumb  and  fingers  in  the  human  hand,  which 
makes  of  it  such  a  wonderful  servant  of  the  thought.  They 
belong  to  the  group  of  sisterly  powers  which  the  Creator 
has  placed  in  the  human  soul  —  varied,  complex,  like  and 
unlike. 

"  Facies  non  omnibus  nna, 
Neo  dlversa  tamen,  qualis  decet  esse  sororum.'* 


130    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 


CHAPTER    VI. 

orthodox  idea  of  sin,  as  depravity  and  as  guilt. 

§  1.  The  Question  stated.  —  We  now  approach  the  ortho- 
doxy of  Orthodoxy — the  system  of  sin  and  redemption,  which 
constitutes  its  most  essential  character.  The  questions  hith- 
erto treated — -the  natural  and  supernatural,  miracles,  the 
Scriptures  —  belong  to  universal  religion.  On  these  points 
heretics  and  the  Orthodox  may  agree.  But  the  essence  of 
heresy,  in  the  eyes  of  an  Orthodox  man,  is  to  vary  from  the 
standards  of  belief  in  regard  to  sin  and  salvation. 

We  commence  with  the  subject  of  human  sinfulness ;  in 
other  words,  with  the  character  of  man  in  relation  to  Ortho- 
doxy. The  theology  of  the  East  asked,  "What  is  God?" 
and  entered  on  its  course  from  the  specially  theological  side. 
It  began* with  ontology,  and  proceeded  to  psychology.  In 
this,  Oriental  theology  followed  in  the  path  of  Oriental  phi- 
losophy. But  Occidental  theology,  originating  strictly  with 
Augustine,  followed  the  practical  and  experimental  method 
of  European  thought,  and,  instead  of  asking,  "  What  is 
God?"  asked,  instead,  "What  is  man?" 

We  begin,  therefore,  with  the  great  question,  "  What  is 
man?"  This  is  the  radical  question  in  practical,  experi- 
mental theology,  as  the  question,  "What  is  God?"  is  tlie 
radical  question  in  speculative  theology.  But  Ave  are  now 
concerned  in  the  theology  of  experience  and  of  life.  We 
are  seeking  for  human  wants.  Knowing  what  man  is,  we 
can  next  ask  what  he  needs. 

§  2.  The  four  Moments  or  Characters  of  Evil.  The  Fall, 
Natural  Depravity^  Total  Depravity,  Inability.  —  Orthodoxy 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OF   SIN.  1?1 

answers  the  question,  "  What  is  man?  "  by  saying,  "  Mara  is 
a  sinner  ;  "  and  this  answer  has  these  four  moments  :  — 

1.  Man  was  created  at  first  righteous  and  good. 

2.  Man  fell,  in  and  with  Adam,  and  became  a  sinner. 

3.  All  now  born  ai'e  born  totally  corrupt  and  evil ;  — 

4.  And  are  utterly  disabled  to  all  good,  so  as  not  to  have 
rhe  power  of  repenting,  or  even  of  wishing  to  irepent. 

These  four  ideas  are,  — 

First,  that  of  The  Fat  l,  or  Inherited  Evil. 

Second,  ot  Natttpvl  Depravity. 

Third,  of  Total  Depravity. 

Fourth,  of  IXABILITY. 

These  points  are  fully  stated  in  the  following  passage  from 
the  "  Assembly's  Confession  of  Faith,"  chap.  6  :  — 

"  1.  Our  first  parents,  being  seduced  by  the  subtlety  and 
temptation  of  Satan,  sinned  in  eating  the  forbidden  fruit. 
This  their  sin  God  was  pleased,  according  to  his  wise  and 
holy  counsel,  to  permit ;  having  purposed  to  order  it  to  his 
oAvn  glory. 

"  2.  By  this  sin  they  fell  from  their  original  righteousness, 
and  communion  with  God ;  and  so  became  dead  in  sin,  and 
wholly  defiled  in  all  the  faculties  and  parts  of  soul  and  body. 

"  3.  They  being  the  root  of  all  mankind,  the  guilt  of  this 
sin  was  ijipcted,  and  the  same  death  in  sin,  and  corrupted 
nature,  conveyed,  to  all  their  posterity,  descending  from 
them  by  ordinary  generation. 

"  4.  From  this  original  corruption,  whereby  we  are  utter- 
ly indisposed,  disabled,  and  made  opposite  to  all  good,  and 
wholly  inclined  to  all  evil,  do  proceed  all  actual  transgres- 
sions. 

"  5.  This  corruption  of  nature  during  this  life  doth  remain 
in  those  that  are  regenerated ;  and  although  it  be,  through 
Christ,  pardoned  and  mortified,  yet  both  itself  and  all  the 
motions  thereof  are  truly  and  properly  sin. 

"  6,  Every  sin,  both  original  and  actual,  being  a  trans- 


132         orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

gi'ession  of  the  righteous  law  of  God,  and  contrary  thereunto, 
doth  in  its  own  nature  bring  guilt  upon  the  sinner,  whereby 
he  is  bound  over  to  the  wrath  of  God  and  curse  of  the  law, 
and  so  made  subject  to  death,  with  all  miseries,  spiritual, 
temporal,  and  eternal."  * 

"We  assume  the  "  Assembly's  Catechism "  as  almost  the 
standard  of  Orthodoxy.  It  was  prepared  with  the  concur- 
rence of  the  best  minds  in  England,  in  an  age  when  theologi- 
cal discussion  had  sharpened  all  wits  in  that  direction. 
Thoroughly  Calvinistic,  it  is  also  a  wonderfully  clear  and 
precise  statement  of  Calvinism.  Framed  after  long  contro- 
versies, it  had  the  advantage  of  all  the  distinctions  which  are 
made  only  during  controversy.     It  is  a  fortress  made  defen- 

*  The  doctrine  of  the  Roman  Catholics,  as  stated  by  Moehler,  a  distinguished 
Boman  Catholic,  is  as  follows  :  — 

"  The  doctrine  of  the  Catholic  Church  on  original  sin  is  extremely  simple, 
and  may  be  reduced  to  the  ibllowing  propositions :  Adam,  by  sin,  lost  his 
original  justice  and  holiness,  drew  down  on  himself,  by  his  disobedience,  the  dis- 
pleasure and  judgments  of  the  Almighty,  incurred  the  penalty  of  death,  and  thus, 
in  all  Iiis  parts,  —  in  his  body  as  well  as  soul,  —  became  strangely  deteriorated. 
Thus  his  sinful  condition  is  transmitted  to  all  his  posterity  as  descended  from 
him,  entailing  the  consequence  that  man  is,  of  himself,  incapable  —  even  with 
the  aid  of  the  most  perfect  ethical  law  offered  to  liim  from  without  (not  except- 
ing even  the  one  in  the  Old  Covenant)  —  to  act  in  a  manner  agreeable  to  God, 
or  in  any  other  way  to  be  justified  before  him,  save  only  by  the  merits  of  Jesu8 
Christ." 

Tbe  doctrine  of  the  Church  of  England  concerning  original  sin  and  free  will 
is  In  its  ninth  and  tenth  articles,  and  declares  that, — 

"  Original  sin  is  .  .  .  the  fault  and  corruption  of  the  nature  of  every  man, 
that  naturally  is  engendered  of  the  offspring  of  Adam ;  whereby  man  is  very 
far  gone  from  original  righteousness,  and  is,  of  his  ovirn  nature,  inclined  to  evil, 
.  .  .  and  therefore  in  every  person  born  into  the  world  it  deserveth  God's  wrath 
and  damnation.    .    .    . 

"  The  condition  of  man  after  the  fall  of  Adam  is  such  that  he  cannot  turn 
and  prepare  himself  by  his  own  natural  strength  and  good  works  to  faith  and 
calling  upon  God.  Wherefore  we  have  no  power  to  do  good  works,  pleasant 
and  acceptable  to  God,  without  the  grace  of  God  by  Christ  preventing  us,  that 
we  may  have  a  good  will,  and  working  with  us  when  we  have  that  good  will." 

The  early  Fathers  took  different  views  of  the  origin  of  sin.  Tertullian 
ascribed  it  to  human  impatience.  "  Nunc  ut  compondio  dictum  sit,  omne  pecca- 
tum  impatientise  adscribendum."  (Tertul.  De  Patien.5.  )  Origen  thinks  lazi- 
ness the  cause  of  sin ;  sin  is  a  negation  —  not  doing  right.  Justin  Martyr 
ascribes  the  origin  of  sin  to  sensuality.  Origen  (after  Philo)  considered  the 
story  of  the  fall  as  an  allegory,  and  a  type  of  what  takes  place  in  nil  men. 


ORTHODOX   IDEA    OF  SIN.  133 

sible  at  all  points,  because  it  has  been  attacked  so  often  that 
all  its  weak  places  have  been  seen  and  marked.  It  is  a 
masterpiece  of  statement. 

Now,  it  is  very  easy,  and  what  has  often  been  done,  to 
stand  on  the  outside  and  show  the  actual  error  and  logical 
absurdity  of  this  creed  ;  to  show  that  men  are  not  by  nature 
totally  depraved,  and  that,  if  they  were,  this  would  not  be 
guilt ;  that,  if  they  have  no  power  to  repent,  they  are  not  to 
blame  for  not  repenting  ;  and  that  God,  as  a  God  of  justice 
even  (to  say  nothing  of  mercy,  of  love,  of  a  heavenly  Father), 
cannot  condemn  and  punish  us  for  a  depraved  nature  inher- 
ited from  Adam. 

It  is  easy  to  say  all  this.  But  it  has  often  been  said  ;  and 
with  what  result?  Unitarians  have  been,  by  such  arguments, 
confirmed  in  their  Unitarianism  ;  but  the  Orthodox  have  not, 
by  such  arguments,  been  convinced  of  the  falsity  of  their 
creed.  Let  us  see,  then,  if  we  cannot  find  some  truth  in  this 
system,  —  some  vital,  experimental  truth,  —  for  the  sake  of 
which  the  Orthodox  cling  to  these  immense  and  incredible 
inconsistencies.  Let  us  take  an  inside  view  of  Orthodoxy, 
and  see  why,  being  unreasonable,  it  yet  commends  itself  to 
so  many  minds  of  the  highest  ordar  of  reason. 

§  3.  Orthodox  and  Liberal  View  of  Man,  as  morally  dis- 
eased or  otherwise. — Let  us  begin  with  the  substance  of  Or- 
thodoxy (neglecting,  at  present,  its  form),  and  say,  in 
general,  that  it  regards  human  nature  as  being  in  an  abnor- 
mal or  diseased  condition.  The  first  thing  to  be  done  with 
man,  according  to  Calvinism,  is  to  cure  him.  Many  sys- 
tems, diiFei'iug  from  each  other  in  name,  agree  in  this  —  that 
they  do  not  believe  in  any  such  diseased  condition  of  man. 
According  to  them,  he  is  not  to  be  cured,  but  to  be  educated. 
The  Church  is  not  a  hospital,  but  an  academy.  Man  needs, 
mainly,  instruction.  His  purposes,  in  the  main,  are  right ; 
but  he  errs  as  to  what  he  has  to  do.  What  he  requires  is 
precept  and  example. 
12 


134     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

As  Orthodoxy  believes  man  to  be  diseased,  its  object  is 
twofold,  and  the  truths  which  it  employs  are  of  two  kinds. 
First,  it  seeks  to  convince  man  that  he  really  has  a  danger- 
ous disease  ;  and  then  to  convince  him,  that,  by  using  the 
right  means,  he  can  be  cured.  It  therefore  constantly  dwells 
upon  two  classes  of  truths :  first,  those  which  reveal  man's 
sinfulness  and  his  ruined  condition  ;  and,  secondly,  those 
which  reveal  the  plan  of  saving  him  from  this  condition  — 
a  plan  which  has  been  devised  by  the  Almighty,  and  which 
is  accomplished  in  Christianity.  Orthodoxy  dwells  upon  sin 
and  salvation :  these  are  its  two  pivotal  doctrines. 

On  the  other  hand,  all  the  systems  which  may  be  asso- 
ciated under  the  term  "Liberal  Christianity"  regard  man, 
not  as  in  a  state  of  disease,  and  needing  medicine,  but  as  in 
a  state  of  health,  needing  diet,  exercise,  and  favorable  cir- 
cumstances, in  order  that  he  may  grow  up  a  well-developed 
individual.  It  regards  sin,  not  as  a  radical  disease  with 
which  all  are  born,  but  as  a  temporary  malady  to  which  all 
are  liable.  It  does  not,  therefore,  mainly  dwell  on  sin  and 
salvation,  but  on  duty  and  improvement.  Man's  nature  it 
regards,  not  as  radically  evil,  but  as  radically  good  ;  and 
even  as  divine,  because  made  by  God. 

Here,  then,  in  the  doctrine  of  evil,  lies  the  essential  distinc- 
tion between  the  two  great  schools  of  thought  which  have 
divided  the  Church.  What  is  evil  ?  and  how  is  it  to  be  re- 
garded ?  This  is,  perhaps,  the  most  radical  question  in  Chris- 
tian theology.  Is  evil  positive,  or  only  negative  ?  Is  it  a 
reality,  or  only  a  form?  What  is  it?  Whence  comes  it? 
Until  these  questions  are  exhaustively  discussed,  there  is  lit- 
tle hope  of  union  in  theology. 

§  4.  Sin  as  Disease.  —  We  regard  Orthodoxy  as  substan- 
tially right  in  its  views  of  sin  as  being  a  deep  and  radical  dis- 
ease. Our  Saviour  says,  "  I  came  not  to  call  the  righteous, 
but  sinners,  to  repentance."  "  The  Son  of  man  came  to 
seek  and  to  save  that  which  is  lost." 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OP   SIN.  135 

But  the  question  recurs,  Is  there  only  one  kind  of  sin,  — 
namely,  voUintary  and  conscious  transgression  of  God's  law, 
originating  with  the  individual  himself,  and  in  the  moment 
of  committing  it,  by  means  of  his  free  will,  which  is  its  only 
seat?  or  is  thei'e  sin  which  is  a  tendency  in  man's  nature, 
something  permanent,  involuntary,  of  which  he  is  not  con- 
scious, and  which  has  its  seat  not  merely  in  the  will,  but  in 
ihe  desii'es  and  affections.  To  this  question  Liberal  Chris- 
tianity has  commonly  said,  "  No,"  and  Orthodoxy  has  said, 
"  Yes." 

And  on  this  point  I  concur  with  Orthodoxy.  Besides  the 
sin  which  consists  in  free  choice,  and  which  is  essentially 
transient,  there  is  also  the  sin  which  consists  in  wrong  de- 
sire, and  which  is  essentially  pei'manent,  because  it  is  a  habit 
of  the  mind.  If  it  were  not  so,  there  could  be  no  such  thing 
as  a  bad  character,  and  no  such  thing  as  a  vicious  habit. 

If  we  attempt  to  analyze  evil,  we  shall  find  that  it  may  be 
conveniently  distributed  into  these  divisions  :  — 

1.  Physical  Evil. 
(a.)    Pain. 
(6.)    Weakness. 
(c.)    Physical  disease. 

2.   Intellectual  or  Mental  Eyxl. 

(a.)    Ignorance. 

(b.)    Error,  or  mistake. 

(c.)    Sophism,  or  falsehood. 

3.   Moral  Evil.     Disobedience  to  the  Moral  Law. 

(a.)  Ignorant  and  accidental,  or  transgression. 

(6.)  Habitual  disobedience,  or  vice. 

(c.)  Wilful  violation  of  human  law  ;  crime. 

(d.)  Diseased  moral  state,  as  selfishness,  bad  temper,  &c. 


136         oethodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

4.   Spiritual  Evil. 

(a.)    Wilful  alienatioa  from  God,  or  perverse  choice. 
(&•)    Spiritual  inability. 

Now,  we  see  that  in  all  these  divisions  of  evil,  —  physi- 
cal, intellectual,  moral,  and  spiritual,  —  it  is  found  in  the 
two  forms  of  active  and  passive  evil.  In  the  latter  form  it 
is  disease,  and  independent  of  the  will. 

Returning,  then,  to  the  Orthodox  view  of  evil,  which  it  is 
our  business  to  examine,  we  find  already  that  it  has  the  ad- 
vantage of  the  Liberal  theology  in  recognizing  this  passive 
side  of  evil,  which  we  may  call  disease.  It  is  true  that  Or- 
thodoxy has  not  yet  succeeded  in  coming  to  any  clearness  on 
this  question,  and  has  not  yet  any  firm,  intellectual  hold  of 
the  main  points  of  its  argument.  Examples  of  this  confu- 
sion are  quite  comaion.  Not  to  go  back  to  the  Calvinistic 
and  Arminian  controversies,  which  were  but  a  revival  of  the 
Augustinian  and  Pelagian  dispute  ;  not  to  recur  even  to  the 
Hopkinsian  and  Edwardian  discussions,  —  we  have  only  to 
refer  to  the  differences  between  new  and  old  school  theology 
in  the  Presbyterian  Church  ;  to  the  trial  of  Dr.  Beecher ;  to 
the  book  of  his  son  Edward ;  to  the  divergence  of  Andover 
from  New  Haven,  and  Princeton  from  Andover.  Unsettled, 
because  superficial,  views  of  evil  are  at  the  roots  of  all  these 
controversies. 

§  5.  Doctrine  of  the  Fall  in  Adam,  and  Natural  Deprav- 
ity. Their  Truth  and  Error.  —  The  first  point  of  the  doc- 
trine of  evil  regards  the  Fall,  including  the  doctrine  of 
depravity. 

Modern  French  philosophers  have  dwelt  much  on  what 
they  call  the  solidarity  of  the  human  race.  By  this  they 
mean  that  two  individuals  are  not  independent  of  each  other, 
like  two  trees  standing  side  by  side,  but  like  two  buds  on  the 
same  tree  or  bough.  There  is  a  common  life-sap  flowing 
through  them  all.     Let  the  life  of  the  tree  be  attacked  any- 


ORTHODOX   IDEA    OF   SIN.  137 

■where,  —  in  its  roots,  its  truuk,  its  limbs,  —  and  all  these 
individual  buds  feel  it.  Yet  eacli  bud  has  also  a  life  of  its 
own,  and  develops  its  own  stalk,  leaves,  blossom,  fruit.  It 
can  be  taken  from  its  own  tree,  and  put  into  another  tree,  and 
grow.  So  it  is  with  separate  men  grafted  into  the  great  tree 
of  mankind.  No  one  lives  to  himself,  nor  dies  to  himself. 
If  one  sufters,  all  suffer.  The  life  of  mankind,  becoming 
diseased,  pours  disease  into  all  individual  men. 

Now,  is  there  not  something  in  tliis  doctrine  to  which  our 
instincts  assent?  Do  not  we  feel  it  true  that  we  inherit  not 
our  own  life  merely,  but  that  of  our  race  ?  and  is  not  this  the 
essential  truth  in  the  doctrine  of  the  fall? 

It  is  true  that  we  fell  in  Adam.  It  is  also  true  that  we 
fell  in  every  act  of  sin,  in  every  weakness  and  folly,  of  any 
subsequent  child  of  Adam.  We  are  all  drawn  downward  by 
every  sin  ;  we  are  lifted  upward,  too,  by  every  act  of  heroic 
virtue,  not  by  example  only,  but  also  by  that  mysterious  in- 
fluence, that  subtile  contagion,  finer  than  anything  visible, 
ponderable,  or  tangible,  —  that  effluence  from  eye,  voice, 
tone,  manner,  which,  according  to  the  character  which  is 
behind,  communicates  au  impulse  of  faith  and  courage,  or  an 
impulse  of  cowardice  and  untruth  ;  Avhich  may  be  transmit- 
ted onward,  forward,  on  every  side,  like  the  widening  circles 
in  a  disturbed  lake,  —  circles  which  meet  and  cross  each 
other  without  disturbance,  and  whose  influence  may  be 
strictly  illimitable  and  infinite. 

No  doubt,  sin  began  with  the  historical  Adam  —  the  first 
man  who  lived.  "  By  one  man  sin  entered  into  the  Avorld, 
and  deatli  by  sin."  But  still  more  true  is  it  that  we  fell  in 
the  typical  Adam  —  Adam  who  stands  for  innocent,  ignorant 
human  nature  before  temptation  ;  truest  of  all,  that  we  fall 
in  Adam,  because  we  are,  each  of  us,  at  first  an  Adam. 

We  are  all  in  the  garden  ;  we  are  at  first  placed  in  para- 
dise ;  and  each  has  in  himself  all  the  four  dramatis  personoe 
—  Adam,  Eve,  the  Serpent,  and  the  Voice  of  God.  Adam 
12* 


138    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

is  the  will,  the  power  of  choice,  the  masculiue  element,  in 
man  ;  Eve  is  the  affection,  the  desire,  the  feminine  element, 
in  man ;  the  Voice  of  God  is  the  higher  reason  in  th(;  soul, 
through  which  infinite  truth  commands,  —  i.  e.,  the  higher 
law ;  and  the  Serpent,  the  lower  reason  in  the  soul,  the  cun- 
ning element,  the  sophistical  understanding,  which  can  put 
evil  for  good,  and  good  for  evil.  The  gai'den  is  our  early 
innocence,  where  there  is  no  struggle,  no  remorse,  no  anxi- 
e  y ;  where  goodness  is  not  labor,  but  impulse.  But,  when 
we  go  out  of  the  garden,  we  enter  a  life  of  trial,  till  we  reach 
the  higher  paradise,  the  kingdom  of  heaven ;  and  then  joy 
and  duty  become  one  again.     Then  — 

"  Love  is  an  unerring  light, 
And  joy  its  own  security." 

From  paradise,  through  the  world,  to  heaven ;  from  Egypt, 
through  the  wilderness,  to  Canaan  ;  from  innocence,  through 
temptation,  sin,  repentance,  faith,  to  regeneration,  —  such  is 
the  progress  of  man. 

To  me,  the  belief  that  I  fell  in  Adam  is  not  an  opinion 
fraught  only  with  sadness.  This  tide  of  life  which  comes 
pouring  through  me  comes  from  ten  thousand  ancestors. 
.All  their  sorrows  and  joys,  temptations  and  struggles,  sins 
and  virtues,  have  helped  to  make  it  what  it  is.  I  am  a 
member  of  a  great  body.  I  am  willing  to  be  so  —  to  bear 
the  fortunes  and  misfortunes  of  my  race. 

It  is  true  that  I  find  evil  tendencies  in  me,  which  I  did  not 
cause ;  but  I  know,  that,  for  whatever  part  I  am  not  the 
cause,  I  am  not  accountable.  For  this  part  of  my  life  I  do 
not  dread  the  wrath,  but  rather  claim  the  pity,  of  my  God. 
My  nature  I  find  to  be  diseased  —  not  well ;  needing  cure, 
and  not  merely  food  and  exercise.  I  can,  therefore,  the 
more  easily  believe  that  God  has  sent  me  a  physician,  and 
that  I  shall  be  cured  by  him.  I  can  believe  in  a  future 
emancipation  from  these  tendencies   to  vanity,  sensuality, 


ORTHODOX   IDEA    OP   SIN.  139 

indolence,  anger,  wilfulness,  impatience,  obstinacy  —  tenden- 
cies which  are,  in  me,  not  crime,  but  disease  ;  and  I  can  see 
how  to  say  with  Paul,  "  Now,  then,  it  is  no  more  /  that  do 

it,  but  SIN  THAT  DWELLETH  IN  ME." 

If,  now,  we  return  to  the  consideration  of  the  Orthodox 
doctrine  of  the  fall,  as  set  forth  by  the  Westminster  Assem- 
bly, we  shall  find  it  to  be  half  true  and  half  false.  It  states 
truly  (chap.  6,  §  1)  that  our  first  parents  sinned,  and  also 
(§  2)  that  by  this  sin  they  fell  from  their  original  righteous- 
ness ;  for  this  only  means  that  the  first  conscious  act  of 
disobedience  by  man  produced  alienation  from  God,  and 
degeneracy  of  nature.  This  was  no  arbitrary  punishment, 
but  the  natural  consequence.  The  creed  also  says  truly 
(§  3)  that  this  corrupted  nature  was  conveyed  to  all  their 
posterity  ;  for  this  only  means,  that,  by  the  laws  of  descent, 
good  and  evil  qualities  are  transmitted ;  which  all  wise  ob- 
servers of  human  nature  knew  to  be  the  fact.  It  is  also  true 
(§  5)  that  this  corrupt  nature  does  remain  (to  some  extent 
at  least),  even  in  the  regenerate,  in  this  life. 

So  far,  so  true.  Sin,  as  disease^  began  with  the  first 
man,  in  his  first  sin,  and  has  been  transmitted,  by  physical, 
moral,  and  spiritual  influences,  from  him  to  us  all. 

But  now  we  find  complicated  with  these  truths  other  state- 
ments, which  we  must  need  regard  as  falsehoods.  Tried 
either  by  reason  or  Scripture,  they  are  palpably  untrue,  and 
are  very  dangerous  errors. 

The  first  error  of  Orthodoxy  is  in  declaring  transmitted  or 
inherited  evil  to  be  total.  It  declares  that  our  first  parents 
"were  wholly  defiled  in  all  faculties  and  parts  of  soul  and 
body,"  and  that  lue,  in  consequence,  "  are  utterly  indisposed, 
disabled,  and  made  opposite  to  all  good,  and  wholly  inclined 
to  all  evil."  This  statement  is  indefensible.  But  we  shall 
consider  this  in  another  section  on  "Total  Depravity,"  and 
only  allude  to  it  now  in  passing. 

Another  error,  however,  and  a  very  important  one,  is  to 


140    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

attribute  the  guilt  of  Adam  and  Eve  to  their  descendants. 
This  is  the  famous  doctrine  of  imputation,  which  is  now 
rejected  by  all  the  leading  schools  of  modern  Orthodoxy. 
That  we  can  be  guilty  of  Adam's  sin,  either  by  imputation 
or  in  any  other  way,  seems  too  absurd  and  immoral  a  state- 
ment to  be  now  received. 

But  though  many  intelligent  Orthodox  teachers  and  be- 
lievers do  now  reject  the  imputation  of  Adam's  sin,  they 
admit  what  is  just  as  false  and  just  as  immoral  a  doc- 
trine. They  make  us  guilty  for  that  part  of  sin  which  is 
depravity,  as  well  as  for  that  which  is  wilful. 

Whatever,  either  of  moral  good  or  moral  evil,  proceeds 
from  our  nature,  and  not  from  our  will,  has  no  character  of 
merit  or  demerit.  The  reason  is  evident,  and  is  stated  by 
the  apostle  Paul.  We  are  only  guilty  for  what  we  do  our- 
selves ;  we  are  only  meritorious  for  what  we  do  ourselves  : 
but  what  our  nature  does,  we  do  not  do.  "  Now,  then,  it  is 
no  more  /  that  do  it,  but  sin  that  dwelleth  in  me." 

Professor  Shedd,  late  of  Andover,  some  years  ago  published 
a  very  able  essay  in  the  "  Christian  Review,"  the  title  of 
which  was,  "  Sin  a  Nature,  and  that  Nature  Guilt."  This 
title  is  a  sufficient  refutation  of  the  essay.  A  man  could  not 
utter  a  more  palpable  contradiction,  if  he  said,  "  The  sun 
solid,  and  that  solid  fluid,"  or,  "  The  earth  black,  and  that 
black  white."  * 

There  are  two  kinds  of  moral  good  and  two  kinds  of  moral 
evil,  which  are  essentially  different.  The  two  kinds  of  moral 
good  may  be  named  moral  virtue  and  moral  beauty ;  the  two 
kinds  of  moral  evil  may  be  named  guilt  and  depravity. 
Now,  so  far  as  goodness  proceeds  from  a  beautiful  nature, 
it  is  not  virtuous,  and  so  far  as  sin  proceeds  from  a  depraved 
nature,  it  is  not  guilty.  We  can  conceive  of  an  angelic 
nature  with  no  capacity  of  virtue,  because  incapable  of  guilt. 

•  See,  in  the  Appendix,  an  examination  of  Professor  Shedd's  article. 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OF   SIN.  141 

We  can  also  conceive  of  a  nature  so  depraved  as  to  be  inca- 
pable of  guilt,  because  incapable  of  virtue. 

§  6.  Examination  of  Bomans,  5:  12-21.  —  The  famous 
passage  in  Paul  (Rom.  5  :  12-21),  which  is  the  direct  scrip- 
tural foundation  claimed  for  the  doctrine  of  Adam's  fall  pro- 
ducing guilt  in  his  posterity,  is  in  reality  a  support  of  our 
view.  The  only  other  passage  (1  Cor.  15  :  22)  where  Adam 
is  referred  to,  declares  that  we  all  die  in  him,  but  by  no 
means  asserts  that  we  sm  in  him. 

The  passage  referred  to  runs  thus  (Rom.  5  :  12-18)  :  — 

Verse  12  :  "  As  by  one  man  sin  entered  into  the  world," — 

(Paul  here  refers  to  the  fact  that  sin  began  with  the  first 
man.) 

"  And  death  by  sin  ;  " — 

(By  means  of  the  sin  of  one  man,  death  entered.) 

"  And  so  death  passed  upon  all  men,  for  that  all  have 
sinned." 

(Ratlier  "  death  came  upon  all  men,  because  all  have 
sinned."  The  Vulgate  has  here  in  quo,  "  in  whom  ; "  that 
is,  in  Adam.  So  Augustine.  But  even  those  who,  like  01s- 
hausen,  contend  for  Augustine's  views,  admit  that  icp'  w  here 
is  a  conjunction,  equivalent  to  because,  and  not  a  relative.) 

The  next  five  verses  (13,  14,  15,  16,  17)  constitute  a 
parenthesis,  and  refer  to  an  objection  which  is  not  stated. 
Some  one  might  say,  "  How  could  all  sin,  from  Adam  to 
Moses,  when  there  was  no  law  till  Moses?  and  you,  Paul, 
have  said  (Rom.  4  :  15),  that  "  where  there  is  no  law  there 
is  no  transgression." 

Paul  replies  that  "  sin  is  not  imputed  without  law  ;  "  that 
is,  as  I  think  evident,  it  is  not  regarded  as  guilt.  A  man 
who  sins  ignorantly  is  not  guilty  ;  but  he  suffers  the  conse- 
quences of  his  sin,  which  are  depravity  of  his  nature,  or 
moral  death.  "  Sin  is  not  imputed,"  says  Paul ;  "but  death 
reigns."  Those  who  do  not  sin  "  after  the  similitude  of 
Adam's  transgression,"  —  that  is,  wlio  do  not  violate  a  posi- 


142    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

tive  command,  —  nevertheless  are  depraved  morally,  and 
are  dead  Spiritually.  The  Hottentots  and  Fejee  Islanders 
violate  no  positive  law  given  them  by  God,  and  consequently 
are  not  guilty  of  that ;  but  because  they  violate  (even  igno- 
rantly)  the  laws  of  their  moral  nature,  they  are  depraved 
morally. 

We  see,  then,  that  Paul  distinctly  recognizes  the  distinc- 
tion made  above  between  sin  as  guilt  and  sin  as  depravity. 

He  distinguishes  between  sin  as  sinfulness,  or  unconscious 
transgression  (r;  cc//«^T/a),  and  sin  as  conscious  transgression 
of  a  known  command  (^naQdtCuaig). 

The  consequence  of  the  first  is  death,  or  moral  and  spir- 
itual depravity ;  the  consequence  of  the  second  is  condemna- 
tion, or  a  sense  of  guilt. 

Sinfulness,  bringing  with  it  depravity  (the  general  de- 
moralization of  human  nature),  began  with  Adam.  All 
became  involved  in  sinfulness,  and  consequently  all  partook 
of  the  depravity  which  belongs  to  it  as  its  wages. 

It  should,  however,  be  observed  that  it  is  not  the  purpose 
of  Paul  to  teach  anything  about  Adam.  His  intention  is  to 
teach  something  about  Christ.  He  refers  to  Adam's  case  as 
something  they  all  are  acquainted  with  ;  he  compares  Christ's 
case  with  it  both  by  contrast  and  resemblance.  But  his  ob- 
ject is  not  to  instruct  us  about  Adam,  but  about  Christ.  He 
uses  Adam  as  an  example  to  enforce  his  doctrine  about 
Christ.  Through  Christ,  goodness  and  happiness  were  to 
come  into  the  world.  He  illustrated  this  fact,  and  made  it 
appear  probable,  by  the  fact  which  they  already  knew  — 
that  through  Adam  sin  and  death  had  entered  the  world. 
If  it  seemed  strange,  in  an  age  in  which  men  were  so  dis- 
united, that  one  man  should  be  the  medium  of  communicat- 
ing goodness  to  the  whole  human  race,  they  might  remember 
that  Adam  also  had  been  the  medium  of  introducing  sin  to 
the  whole  human  race.  If  the  Jews  wondered  that  Christ 
should  bring  salvation  to  those  who  were  not  under  the  law, 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OF   SIN.  143 

they  might  remember  that  Adam  had  brought  death  to  those 
not  under  the  hiw,  and  \vlio  did  not  sin  as  he  did.  It"  they 
doubted  how  Christ's  goodness  could  help  to  make  men 
righteous,  they  might  remember  that  in  some  way  Adam's 
transgression  had  helped  to  make  men  sinners.  Yet,  after 
all,  the  main  fact  which  he  states  is  in  the  twelfth  verse, 
chapter  five  —  "  that  by  one  man  sin  entered  into  the  world, 
and  death  by  sin."  This  amounts  to  saying  that  sin  began 
with  Adam.  Then  he  adds,  in  the  same  verse,  "  that  death 
has  passed  upon  all  men,  because  all  have  sinned."  He  there- 
fore distinctly  declares  that  every  man  is  punished  for  his 
own  sin,  and  not  for  the  sin  of  Adam. 

In  the  other  passage  (1  Cor.  15  :  22),  Paul  says,  "As  in 
Adam  all  die,  even  so,  in  Christ,  shall  all  be  made  alive."  He 
does  not  say  here,  eitlfer  that  "  all  sinned  in  Adam,"  or  that 
"  all  fell  in  Adam,"  or  that  "  all  died  in  Adam."  It  is  the 
present  tense,  "  all  die  in  Adam." 

What  he  means  by  this,  he  explains  himself  afterwards. 
He  tells  us  that  as  "  souls  "  descended  from  Adam,  we  are 
liable  to  death  ;  as  spirits  quickened  by  Christ,  we  are  filled 
with  spiritual  and  immortal  life. 

In  the  forty-fourth  verse  he  gives  the  explanation.  The 
body  "is  sown  a  natural  body"  (^aibuu  ipv/jy-ov^  —r literally  a 
soul-body,  a  body  vitalized  by  the  soul.  "  It  is  raised  a  spirit- 
ual body"  —  literally  spirit-body  ((/ai,w«  Tivevf/unxup'),  a  body 
vitalized  by  the  spirit.  "  There  is  a  soul-body,  and  there  is 
a  spirit-body."  "  And  so  it  is  written,  The  first  man,  Adam, 
was  made  a  living  soul "  (which  is  a  quotation  from  Genesis 
2:7  —  "and  man  became  a  living  soul),"  "but  the  last 
Adam,"  says  Paul  (meaning  Christ),  "became  a  life-making 
spirit."  But,  continues  Paul,  the  soul-man  (psychical  man) 
comes  first ;  the  spiritual-man  afterwards,  according  to  a 
regular  order.  "The  first  man  is  of  the  earth,  earthy;  the 
second  is  the  Lord  from  heaven."  And  then  he  adds,  —  and 
this  is  the  key  to  the  whole  passage,  —  "  .4s  we  have  borne  the 


144     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

image  of  the  earthy,  we  shall  also  bear  the  image  of  the 
heavenly."  '  The  doctrine,  then,  is  plainly  this  :  that,  we  have 
two  natures  —  a  soul-nature,  which  we  derive  from  Adam, 
and  share  with  all  mankind,  which  nature  is  liable  to  weak- 
ness, sin,  and  death ;  and  a  spirit-nature,  which  we  derive 
from  God,  which  Christ  comes  to  quicken  and  vitalize,  and 
the  life  of  which  constitutes  our  true  immortality. 

The  apostle  Paul,  therefore,  does  not  by  any  means  teach 
Calvinism.  The  Catechism  says  that  "  our  first  parents 
being  the  root  of  all  mankind,  the  guilt  of  their  sin  was  im- 
puted to  all  their  posterity."  But  Paul  says,  "  So  death 
passed  upon  all  men,  because  all  have  sinned."  The  Cate- 
chism says  that  "  this  same  death  in  sin,  and  corrupted 
natui-e,  being  conveyed  to  their  posterity,  makes  us  utterly 
indisposed  and  opposite  to  all  good,'*  and  that  "  from  this 
original  corruption  do  proceed  all  actual  transgressions." 

But  if  this  is  so,  there  has  been  no  such  thing  in  the 
world  as  guilt  since  Adam  fell.  If  all  actual  transgressions 
proceed  from  original  corruption,  and  original  corruption 
comes  from  the  first  transgression  of  Adam,  it  logically  fol- 
lows that  there  has  been  but  one  sin  cominitted  in  the  world 
since  it  was  made,  namely,  the  sin  of  Adam.  All  other  sins 
have  been  pure  misfortunes  ;  his  alone  was  guilt.  His  trans- 
gression alone  came  from  a  free  choice  ;  all  others  have  come 
from  an  involuntary  necessity  of  nature. 

Nothing  can  be  more  certain  from  reason  and  Scripture 
than  this  —  that  transgressions  which  come  from  a  corrupt 
nature  are  just  so  far  done  in  us,  and  not  done  by  us.  This 
the  apostle  distinctly  atiirms  when  he  says  (7:  17),  "  Now, 
then,  it  is  no  more  I  that  do  it,  but  sin  that  dwellcth  in 
me."  No  man  is  responsible  for  disease,  when  he  has  not 
brought  that  disease  on  himself,  but  inherited  it  from  his 
ancestors.  The  disease  may  make  him  very  odious,  very 
disagreeable,  but  cannot  make  him  blamable.  Therefore, 
when  Calvin   says   that   hereditary  depravity  "  renders  us 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OF    SIN.  145 

obnoxious  to  the  divine  wrath,"  he  ntters  an  absurdity.  This 
coufusion  of  ideas  runs  through  all  Orthodox  statements  on 
the  subject,  and  the  only  cure  is,  that  we  should  learn  how 
to  make  this  distinction  between  natural  evil  and  moral  evil, 
or  the  evil  which  proceeds  from  a  corrupt  nature  and  the 
evil  which  comes  from  a  free  will. 

li'  we  were  to  sum  up  the  doctrine  of  the  apostle  Paul  on 
this  subject,  it  would  be  thus  :  — 

1.  The  first  man,  Adam,  consisted,  as  we  all  consist,  of 
nature  and  will.  His  nature  consisted  of  innocent  tendencies 
and  appetites.  None  were  excessive  ;  all  were  well  balanced. 
His  nature  inclined  him  no  more  to  evil  than  to  good,  but 
each  faculty  was  in  proper  poise.  The  first  sin,  therefore, 
could  not  have  been  a  gross  one  ;  it  was  a  simple  transgres- 
sion ;  but  its  efiect  was  to  introduce  what  the  apostle  calls 
death  ;  that  is,  a  diseased  or  corrupt  nature.  The  process  is 
this :  With  the  first  conscious  and  free  transgression  there 
arises  a  sense  of  guilt.  This  sense  of  guilt  leads  the  soul 
away  from  God.  Adam  and  Eve  hide  in  the  garden.  Every 
act  of  sin  tends  to  create  a  habit,  and  so  destroys  the  moral 
equipoise.  There  hence  arises  a  tendency  towards  evil,  and 
from  good  ;  and  this  is  called  death,  because  it  takes  us  away 
from  God,  who  is  the  source  of  life. 

2.  A  tendency  towards  evil  is  thus  introduced  intothe  world 
by  the  transgression  of  the  first  man.  His  descendants  are 
now  born  with  a  nature  which  is  not  in  equipoise,  but  which 
leans  more  towards  evil  than  towards  good.  Their  will 
remains  free  as  before  ;  but  they  cannot  perform  the  same 
amount  of  good  as  before.  These  corrupt  tendencies  tempt 
to  greater  sin  than  the  pure  tendencies  did,  and,  whenever 
yielded  to,  bring  a  greater  amount  of  moral  evil  into  the 
race. 

3.  Things,  therefore,  are  thus  growing  worse  continually ; 
for  every  new  act  of  sin  makes  it  easier  to  sin  again.  And 
this  tendency  to  death,  or  estrangement  from  God,  must  go 

13 


146    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

on  increasing,  unless  some  antagonist  principle  can  be  com- 
municated to  the  race.  This  is  actually  done  by  Jesus  Christ. 
The  principle  of  life  which  Christ  introduces  consists  in  rec- 
onciliation to  God.  Sin  separates  us  from  God,  and  there- 
fore tends  to  death.  Christ  reconciles  us  to  God,  and  so  gives 
life.  The  way  in  which  Christ  reconciles  us  to  God  is  by 
manifesting  God's  pardoning  and  saving  love  to  the  sinful 
soul.  In  his  own  life,  but  especially  by  his  death,  he  com- 
municates this  pardoning  love,  and  so  produces  the  atone- 
ment. This  is  the  central,  Pauline  view  of  the  relation  of 
Adam  and  Christ  to  the  race.  Adam  introduces  death  into 
the  world  :  Christ  introduces  life.  He  does  not  speak  at  all 
of  imputation,  or  transfer  of  guilt ;  but  he  speaks  of  an  actual 
communication  of  death  and  life.  Adam  and  Christ  both 
stand  in  actual,  and  not  merely  ideal,  connection  with  the 
whole  race  of  man.  Adam  is  a  living  sovil ;  Christ,  a  life- 
giving  spirit.  By  inheritance,  we  receive  a  depraved  life  of 
the  soul  from  Adam ;  by  communion,  we  receive  an  eternal 
or  spiritual  life  from  Christ.  And,  in  regard  to  both  of  these 
acts,  the  notion  of  blame  or  merit  is  entirely  excluded.  We 
are  not  to  blame  for  our  inherited  depravity  derived  from 
Adam.  We  deserve  no  credit  for  the  salvation  which  comes 
to  us  from  Christ.  The  compensation  for  the  misfortune  of 
inherited  evil  is  the  free  gift  of  divine  goodness  in  Jesus. 

We  have  thus  considered  the  truth  and  the  error  contained 
in  the  Orthodox  doctrine  of  the  fall.  The  truth  of  it  is  in 
its  assertion  of  a  depravity  of  nature,  to  which  we  are  liable 
in  consequence  of  ancestral  sins :  the  error  is  in  imputing 
guilt  to  us  in  consequence  of  them. 

§  7.  Orthodox  View  of  Total  Depravity  and  Inability.— 
In  speaking  of  the  fall  of  man,  we  necessarily  anticipated 
somewhat  the  doctrine  of  total  depravity.  Still,  we  must 
say  something  further  on  this  doctrine,  because  it  is  so  im- 
portant in  the  Church  system  :  it  is,  indeed,  at  its  foundation. 
Those  who  accept,  in  its  strictness,  the  doctrine  of  total 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OF   SIN.  147 

depravity  cannot  avoid  any  point  of  the  severest  Calvinisna. 
Schleiermacher  has  shown,  in  his  "  Essay  on  Election,"  that 
this  hitter  doctrine  necessarily  follows  the  doctrine  of  total 
depravity ;  for,  if  man  is  wholly  depraved,  he  has  no  power 
to  do  anything  for  his  own  conversion  ;  therefore  God  must 
do  it.  And  if  some  are  converted,  and  not  others,  it  must 
be  because  God  chooses  to  convert  some,  and  does  not  choose 
to  convert  others. 

Let  us  look,  then,  at  what  Orthodoxy  says  of  the  extent 
of  human  depravity.  In  all  the  principal  creeds,  this  is  stated 
to  be  unlimited.  Man's  sin  is  total  and  entire.  There  is 
nothing  good  in  him.  The  Westminster  Confession  and  the 
Confession  of  the  New  England  Congregational  churches 
describe  him  as  "  dead  in  sin,  and  wholly  defiled  in  all  the 
faculties  and  parts  of  soul  and  body."  Other  ci'eeds  use 
similar  language. 

In  considering  this  theory,  we  are  struck  at  first  by  the 
circumstance,  that  the  Bible  gives  it  vei-y  little  support.  The 
Bible  continually  speaks  of  man  as  a  sinner ;  but  there  are 
very  few  texts  which  can,  without  strainiug,  be  made  to  seem 
to  teach  that  he  is  totally  depraved.  Let  us  examine  a  few 
of  them. 

§  8.  Proof  Texts.  —  1.  A  text  often  cited  is  Genesis  6  :  5, 
—  the  reason  given  for  destroying  the  human  race,  in  the 
time  of  Noah,  by  the  deluge :  "  And  God  saw  that  the 
wickedness  of  man  was  great  in  the  earth,  and  that  every 
imagination  of  the  thoughts  of  his  heart  was  only  evil  con- 
tinually." But  this  seems  to  be  a  description  of  the  state  of 
the  world  at  that  particular  time,  not  of  its  character  in  all 
ages.  It  is  not  a  description  of  man's  natural  condition,  but 
of  an  extremely  degenerate  condition.  If  the  state  of  the 
world  here  described  was  its  natural  state,  it  would  rather 
be  a  reason  for  not  having  created  the  race  at  first ;  or,  if  it 
was  a  reason  for  destroying  it,  it  would,  at  best,  seem  to  be 
as  strong  a  one  against  creating  it  again.     If  a  man  plants 


148     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

a  tree  in  his  garden,  whose  nature  he  knows  is  to  produce  a 
certain  kind,  of  fruit,  it  would  seem  hardly  a  good  reason  for 
cutting  it  down,  that  it  produced  that  kind  of  fruit :  certainly 
it  would  not  be  a  good  reason  for  cutting  it  down,  and  plant- 
ing another  of  precisely  the  same  kind  in  its  place.  The 
reason  why  the  race  of  men  was  destroyed  was,  that  it  had 
degenerated.  But  there  were  some  good  even  then  ;  for  in 
the  ninth  verse  we  are  told  that  "  Noah  was  a  just  man,  and 
perfect  in  his  generation,  and  walked  with  God." 

2.  There  is  another  passage,  in  the  fourteenth  Psalm 
which  is  quoted  by  Paul  in  Rom.  3  :  "  There  is  none  right 
eous ;  no,  not  one :  there  is  none  that  understandeth,  none 
that  seeketh  after  God.  They  have  all  gone  out  of  the  way, 
they  are  together  become  unprofitable :  there  is  none  that 
doeth  good ;  no,  not  one.  There  is  no  fear  of  God  before 
their  eyes." 

This  passage  is  relied  on  to  prove  total  depravity.  But 
we  may  reply,  that  — 

This  also  is  a  degenerate  condition,  not  a  natural  one.  It 
was  a  condition  into  which  men  had  fallen,  not  one  in  which 
they  were  born.  "  They  have  all  gone  out  of  the  way  ;  they 
are  together  become  unprofitable."  It  does  not,  therefore, 
apply  to  men  universally,  but  to  men  in  those  particular 
times. 

It  was  not  true  of  all,  even  at  that  particular  time.  It  was 
not  true  of  David  himself,  that  he  did  not  seek  after  God,  or 
have  the  fear  of  God  before  his  eyes  ;  or  else  other  passages 
in  the  same  book  are  not  true,  in  which  he  says  the  contrary, 
"  O  God  !  early  will  I  seek  thee  :  my  soul  thirsteth  for  thee  ; 
my  flesh  longeth  for  thee."  He  also  frequently  speaks 
of  and  to  those  who  fear  the  Lord,  and  says,  "  I  am  a  com- 
panion to  all  those  that  fear  thee." 

The  "  all"  is  not  to  be  taken  strictly.  It  means  people 
generally  at  that  time.  Just  so  it  is  said,  "  There  went  out 
to  him  Jerusalem  and  all  Judea,  and  all  the  region  round 


ORTHODOX   IDEA   OP   SIN.  149 

about  Jordan  ; "  which  docs  not  imply  that  no  one  staid  at 
home. 

"  But,"  it  may  be  said,  "  docs  not  Paul  teach  that  this  is  to 
be  taken  universally,  Avhen  he  quotes  it,  and  adds,  '  Now  we 
know  that  what  the  law  saith,  it  saith  to  those  under  the 
law,  that  every  mouth  be  stopped,  and  all  the  world  guilty 
before  God  '  ?  We  think  he  means  to  say,  that,  as  this  is  said 
to  Jews,  it  proves  that  Jeius,  as  well  as  Gentiles,  are  very 
guilty.  He  is  addressing  the  Jews,  who  boasted  of  their 
knowledge  of  the  law.  Chap.  2  :  "  Behold,  thou  art  called 
a  Jew,"  &c. 

3.  Jer.  17:9.  "The  heart  is  deceitful  above  all  things, 
and  desperately  wicked." 

If  we  suppose  that  we  are  to  take  this  as  an  unlimited  ex- 
pression, and  not  merely  a  strong  declaration  of  the  wicked- 
ness of  the  Jews,  it  still  does  not  prove  total  depravity  of  the 
nature,  but  merely  that  of  the  affections,  or  "  the  heart." 
Man's  nature  has  other  things  besides  desire :  it  has  con- 
science, reason,  and  will ;  and  it  does  not  follow  that  these 
are  also  depraved. 

4.  Rom.  8:7.  "  The  carnal  mind  is  enmity  against 
God." 

This  does  not  intend  that  the  mind  of  man,  in  its  natural 
state,  is  enmity,  but  in  its  carnal  state  ;  that  is,  when  subject 
to  fleshly  desires.  Nearly  the  same  phrase  is  used  in  the 
verse  before,  and  is  translated,  "  To  be  carnally  minded  is 
death." 

5.  There  is  one  famous  passage,  however,  which  seems  to 
say  that  God  is  angry  with  us  on  account  of  our  nature. 
This  is  a  passage  very  much  quoted,  and  we  hear  it  so  often 
that  it  seems  as  if  the  Bible  was  full  of  such  texts.  It  is  in 
Eph.  2:3.  "  We  were  by  nature  children  of  wrath,  even 
as  others."  This  is  quoted  to  prove  that  God  is  angry  with 
men  for  their  natures,  and  hates  them  for  being  born  evil  — 
just  as  we  may  hate  a  snake,  a  scorpion,  or  spider,  for  its 

13* 


150    obthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

nature.  But,  as  it  happens,  the  very  next  verses  show  that 
this  is  impossible,  unless  God  can  be  hating  one  of  his  crea- 
tures and  loving  it  at  the  very  same  moment. 

For,  in  the  next  verse  Paul  says  that  God  loved  us  with 
a  great  love  xohen  we  were  dead  in  trespasses  and  sins,  an<? 
children  of  ivrath.  It  is  therefore  evident  that  "  children  of 
wrath"  must  mean  something  else.  It  may  mean  that  men 
outside  of  Christianity  —  Jews  and  Gentiles  —  were  afraid  of 
God  ;  living  under  a  constant  sense  of  his  displeasure  ;  that 
God  seemed  to  them  a  terrible  being,  always  disposed  to 
punish  them  with  severity.  This  was  the  fact.  Jews  and 
Gentiles  were  afraid  of  their  gods,  before  Christ  came,  and 
so  were  "  children  of  wrath."  Or  it  may  mean  that  men 
are  exposed  to  the  consequences  of  sin  ;  for,  in  Scripture 
language,  — 

"  God 's  wrathful  said  to  be,  when  he  doth  do 
That  without  wrath  which  wrath  doth  force  us  to.'» 

Moreover,  "  nature,"  in  Scripture  usage,  does  not  necessa- 
rily mean,  "  as  human  beings."  It  often  intends  external 
position,  origin,  and  race.  So  (in  Gal.  2  :  15)  we  read, 
"  Jews  by  nature  ;  "  and  so  (in  Rom.  2  :  27)  "  uucircumcis- 
ion,  which  is  by  nature." 

The  same  word  is  used  twice  in  James  3  :  7,  and  is  trans- 
lated kind.  "  Every  kind  of  beasts,  birds,  serpents,  things 
in  the  sea,  is  tamed  of  m-d.n-kind : "  literally,  "  the  whole 
animal  race  is  tamed  by  the  human  race." 

If  (pvaig  here  meant  "  constitutional  depravity,"  the  same 
word  in  Rom.  2  :  14  must  mean  constitutional  goodness,  where 
we  are  told  that  some  "do  by  nature  the  things  contained  in 
the  law."  So,  too,  we  read  of  the  olive  tree,"  wild  by  na- 
ture, in  Rom.  11 :  24. 

"  By  nature,"  here,  plainly  means  the  original  condition, 
not  the  original  constitution.  Just  so  we  say  that  wild  ani- 
mals are  in  a  state  of  nature,  and  call  savages  the  children 
of  nature. 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OF   SIN.  151 

These  five  texts  are  the  strongest  in  the  Bible  to  support 
the  doctrine  of  total  depravitj',  and,  as  such,  are  constantly 
quoted.  They  have  vc.'-y  little  weight,  and  not  one  of  them 
is  from  the  words  of  Jesus. 

On. the  other  hand,  there  are  many  passages  which  seem 
to  declare  that  there  is  something  good  in  man  in  his  uncon- 
verted or  natural  state,  and  that  even  in  that  state  he  may 
turn  towards  the  light,  and  struggle  against  evil. 

John  3  :  20,  21.  "  Every  one  that  doeth  truth  cometh  to 
the  light." 

Matt.  26:41.  "...  The  spirit  is  willing,  the  flesli  is 
weak." 

Rom.  2  :  24.  "  Gentiles,  who  have  not  the  law,  do  by 
nature  the  things  contained  in  the  law,  and  show  the  work 
of  that  law  which  is  written  in  the  heart." 

Acts  10  :  35.  "  In  every  nation,  he  that  feareth  God, 
and  worketh  righteousness,  is  accepted  of  him." 

But  the  passage  most  strikingly  and  thoroughly  opposed  to 
the  doctrine  of  total  depravity,  is  the  description,  in  the 
seventh  chapter  of  Romans,  of  the  conflict  between  the  law 
in  the  members  and  the  law  of  the  mind.  Paul,  speaking 
evidently  from  his  own  experience  in  his  unconverted  state, 
describes  the  condition  of  one  morally  depraved,  who  is  try- 
ing to  do  right,  but  is  "prevented  by  evil  habits  which  have 
become  a  part  of  himself.  He  describes  this  as  moral  death, 
but  not  guilt.  He  says,  "  It  is  no  more  I  that  do  it,  but  sin 
that  dwelleth  in  me."  He  describes  himself  as  morally  im- 
potent—  wishing  to  do  right,  but  unable  to  do  it.  He  says 
he  delights  in  the  law  of  God  after  the  inner  man.  The  in- 
most is  right,  but  outside  of  that  are  evil  habits,  in  the  body, 
which  drag  down  the  soul  and  enslave  it.  Paul  therefore 
distinctly  says  that  a  man  in  such  a  condition  is  not  himself 
a  sinner,  because  he  does  not  commit  the  sin.  Thus  he 
makes  clear  and  strong  the  distinction  we  referred  to  above, 
between  depravity  and  guilt  —  between  natural  evil  and  moral 
evil. 


152     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

Paul  teaches  that  man  is  not  totally  depraved,  but  that 
even  in  the  carnal  man  there  is  a  good  principle,  only  that 
it  is  conquered  by  the  evil.  If  the  mind  delights  in  the 
law  of  God,  and  the  will  to  do  right  is  present  with  us,  we 
evidently  are  not  totally  depraved  ;  but  the  total  depravity,  if 
anywhere,  is  in  the  flesh  only,  as  Paul  plainly  says  :  "  I  know 
that  in  me  (that  is,  in  7ny  flesh)  dwelleth  no  good  thing;" 
that  is,  the  depravity  is  physical,  not  moral.  But  physical 
depravity  is  not  guilt,  but  only  disease. 

§9.  Truth  in  the  Doctrine  of  Total  Depravity.  —  Never- 
theless there  is  a  sense  in  which  man  may  be  said  to  be  often 
totally  sinful ;  but  this  is  only  in  a  total  alienation  of  the  will 
from  God.  It  is  not  a  total  depravity,  but  a  total  alienation. 
There  is  a  natural  depravity,  but  it  is  not  total.  But  the 
choice  may  be  totally  perverted,  when  it  chooses  darkness 
instead  of  light,  evil  instead  of  good. 

Let  us  see  what  there  is  of  this  in  man. 

The  gospel  of  Christ,  as  we  understand  it,  undertakes  to 
effect  an  entire  change,  a  radical  reformation,  in  human 
character.  It  proposes  to  reform  the  life  by  changing  the 
heart,  by  giving  new  aims,  new  affections,  new  aspirations, 
new  objects  of  love  and  pursuit.  Jesus  does  not  endeavor 
to  alter  and  improve,  a  little  here  and  a  little  there,  on  the 
outside  of  the  character,  to  improve  a  little  our  modes  of 
action  in  this  and  the  other  particular ;  but  he  alters  the 
conduct  and  character  by  altering  the  fundamental  ideas,  and 
inspiring  an  invvai'd  life.  This  wonderful  change,  which  takes 
place  in  the  profoundest  depth  of  our  nature,  under  the  in- 
fluence of  the  Gospel,  —  this  great  event  of  life,  which  forms 
the  turning-point  of  our  being  and  history,  —  is  called  in  the 
New  Testament  "  the  new  birth,"  "  regeneration,"  "  to  be 
born  again,"  "conversion,"  "a  new  creation,"  "to  be  born 
of  God,"  "  to  be  baptized  with  the  Holy  Ghost  and  with 
fire,"  "  to  put  off  the  old  man,"  "  to  have  Christ  formed 
■within  us."     It  is  a  very  superficial  view  which  explains 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OF   SIN.  153 

away  the  meaning  of  nil  these  profound  expressions,  and 
supposes  that  they  only  signify  a  little  outward  inoprovement 
and  reformation.  We  need  just  such  a  change  as  is  here 
described  —  a  radical  one,  not  a  superficial  one.  All  need 
it.  Those  who  are  the  most  pure  in  heart  and  most  blame- 
less in  character  (spotless  children,  as  they  seem  to  us,  of  a 
heavenly  world)  feel  their  owu  need  of  this  change  no  less 
than  do  the  profligate  and  openly  vicious.  Parents  and 
friends  say,  "  We  have  no  fault  to  find  with  them."  They 
do  not  say  they  have  no  fault  to  find  with  themselves.  They 
feel  they  have  all  kinds  of  fault  to  find  with  themselves,  and 
nothing  is  so  painful  to  them  as  this  commendation.  They 
say,  "Outwardly  we  may  seem  innocent,  but  we  feel  an  in- 
ward want  that  weighs  on  our  heart  like  a  frost." 

"  This  is  a  true  saying,  and  worthy  of  all  acceptation,  that 
Christ  Jesus  came  into  the  world  to  save  sinners."  It  is  be- 
cause we  are  sinners  that  Ave  need  to  experience  this  great 
change.  We  do  not  wish  to  exaggerate  the  amount  of  human 
sinfulness.  Theologians  have  carried  their  attacks  on  hu- 
man nature  quite  too  far,  and  the  result  has  often  been  that 
men  have  looked  on  sin  as  a  sort  of  theological  matter,  which 
has  nothing  to  do  with  actual  life.  They  have  cheerfully 
admitted  that  they  were  totally  depraved  by  nature,  and 
could  not  think  or  will  a  good  thing,  and  then  have  thought 
no  worse  of  themselves  than  before.  We  know  that  there 
is  something  good  in  man,  something  which  God  loves, 
some  pure  aspiration  even  in  the  natural  heart,  some  throbs 
of  generosity,  some  warnings  of  conscience,  some  pure 
love,  some  courageous  virtue,  in  the  humblest,  the  most  de- 
praved, the  most  abandoned.  There  ai'e  some  flowers  of 
sweetest  perfume  which  spring  up  in  the  uncultivated  soil 
of  the  natural  heart  on  which  God  and  his  angels  smile,  for 
the  seeds  of  those  flowers  God  himself  planted.  We  have 
seen  harebells,  graceful  and  lovely  as  the  sweetest  green- 
house plant,  growing  out  of  a  sand-heap  ;  and  we  have  seen 


154    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

some  disinterested,  generous  benevolence  in  the  mind  of  a 
hardened  profligate.  It  is  not,  therefore,  because  there  is 
nothing  good  in  man  that  he  needs  a  change  of  heart,  but 
because  he  is  destitute  of  a  deep-rooted  and  living  goodness 
till  this  change  has  taken  place. 

Look  at  the  actual  sins  of  men.  The  majority  of  men,  in 
a  civilized  community  like  ours,  do  not  commit  great  crimes, 
or  fall  into  flagrant  vices,  because  they  have  little  to  attract 
them  to  such  a  course,  and  much  to  deter  them  from  it, 
They  are  aiming  at  those  objects  which  they  need  the  coun- 
tenance, aid,  and  good  opinion  of  their  fellow-men  to  obtain  . 
to  be  glaringly  vicious  would  make  it  impossible.  Also, 
there  is  a  certain  amount  of  conscience  which  restrains  them 
—  the  influence  of  good  education  and  good  habits  which 
preserves  a  certain  uprightness  and  purity  of  character. 
But  is  it  a  deep  principle  ?  If  so,  why  do  the  vast  majority 
of  men  allow  themselves  in  many  small  violations  of  the 
same  laws  which  they  would  not  break  on  a  large  scale? 
They  would  not  steal ;  yet  they  commit  every  day  some 
slight  acts  not  perfectly  honest ;  they  take  advantage  of  others 
in  little  things.  They  would  not  lie ;  yet  they  exaggerate, 
and  conceal  part  of  the  truth,  and  color  their  statements  to 
produce  an  effect.  They  would  not  kill ;  but  they  are  will- 
ing to  injure  one  who  has  interfered  with  their  interests. 
With  these  tendencies  and  feelings,  why  would  they  not, 
under  different  influences,  commit  greater  crimes?  How 
often  do  we  feel,  in  talking  with  the  criminal  and  abandoned, 
that,  in  their  circumstances  and  with  their  temptations,  we 
might  have  been  as  bad  as  they  ! 

Does  not  all  this  show  that  there  is  a  deep  and  hidden 
fountain  of  evil  within  our  hearts  which  is  restrained  by 
external  influences,  by  checks  and  barriers  with  which  God 
has  kindly  surrounded  us?  and  if  these  were  taken  away, 
it  would  break  out  into  something  far  worse  than  now 
appears.     How  much  there  is  of  evil  under  the  smooth  sur- 


ORTHODOX    IDKA    OF    SIN.  155 

face  of  refined  society!  How  many  thoughts  of  sin  pass  to 
and  fro  in  the  heart  while  the  countenance  seems  pure  and 
calm  !  "NVho  ever  looked  into  the  interior  depths  of  our 
most  moral  community,  and  saw  all  the  secret  sins  aud  pol- 
lutions which  are  hidden  there?  Every  now  and  then  there 
occurs  in  the  midst  of  the  most  refined  classes  some  startling 
revelation  of  long-concealed  wickedness  which  makes  men 
look  each  other  in  the  face  and  draw  a  long  breath,  as 
though  they  should  say,  "  Which  of  us  will  next  fall?"  So 
iu  the  midst  of  a  fruitful  country,  of  lakes,  and  valleys,  and 
vine-clad  hills,  the  earth  will  sometimes  open,  and  a  river  of 
melted  lava  pour  forth,  desolating  all  around.  We  hear  of 
this  with  wonder,  and  do  not  think  that  right  beneath  our 
owTi  feet,  a  few  miles  down,  under  these  smooth  fields  and 
gentle  plains,  that  same  fiery  ocean  is  rolling  its  red  billows. 
God  has  laid  his  hand  upon  our  heart,  and  restrains  its  law- 
less passions  as  he  restrains  the  tornadoes,  and  earthquakes, 
and  volcanic  fires  ;  else  they  might  easily  hurry  us  to  swift 
destruction. 

Still,  if  this  were  all,  no  radical  change  might  be  neces- 
sary. It  might  be  enough  that  by  effort,  and  self-discipline, 
and  direction  of  the  thoughts,  we  gradually  overcome  our 
evil  habits  and  tendencies  ;  but  when  we  resolve  to  do  so, 
and  make  the  effort,  we  meet  Avith  an  unexpected  resistance. 
"  The  spirit  is  willing,  but  the  flesh  is  weak."  "  I  find  a 
law  in  my  members  warring  against  the  law  of  my  mind, 
and  bringing  me  into  captivity  to  the  law  of  sin  in  my  mem- 
bers." The  Church  has  long  asserted  the  doctrine  of  an 
hereditary  depravity  ;  and  we  have  seen  that  there  is  mora 
truth  in  it  than  we  have  sometimes  supposed.  It  is  not 
total,  but  it  is  real.  Besides  the  sins  of  our  own  committing, 
there  are  the  sins  which  our  ancestors  have  committed,  which 
have  made  themselves  part  of  our  bone  and  flesh.  We  are 
not  exactly  balanced  in  our  natural  state  ;  there  is  a  prepon- 
derating tendency  towards  evil  in  one  or  another  direction. 


156      ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

This  forms  too  fearful  an  alliance  with  circumstances,  the 
moment  they  become  powerful  to  draw  us  away  from  good. 
A  friend  of  ours,  some  years  since,  was  making  a  trip  up  the 
Lakes,  late  in  the  season.  As  they  entered  Lake  Huron 
from  the  River  St.  Clair  in  the  noble  steamer,  the  skies  wei-e 
serene,  and  she  ploughed  her  way  on  towards  the  north,  so 
that  by  night  the  land  had  sunk  almost  out  of  sight.  But 
then  the  wind  began  to  freshen,  the  sea  rose,  and  as  the  night 
advanced,  and  the  wind  blew  harder  and  harder,  the  boat 
strained  and  staggered  along,  occasionally  struck  hard  by  a 
heavier  sea,  till  at  last  one  of  her  wheels  was  carried  away, 
and  the  fires  were  put  out  by  the  water.  How  long  and 
anxious  was  that  night !  How  many  prayed  then  who  never 
prayed  before !  When  morning  came,  the  boat  was  found 
to  be  drifting  before  the  wind  and  waves,  directly  upon  a 
rocky  shore  on  _  the  south-east  side  of  the  lake.  There  was 
no  help  in  man  ;  but  a  gracious  Providence  all  at  once  caused 
the  storm  to  lull,  so  that  a  fire  could  be  built,  and  with  one 
wheel  the  boat  got  into  a  harbor.  Man  seems  a  powerful 
being  when  he  is  surrounded  by  favorable  circumstances,  and 
is  going  with  a  fair  wind  and  fair  weather ;  but  let  the  wind 
change,  and  his  weakness  becomes  apparent.  He  who  just 
now  breasted  the  tide,  is  now  drifting  helplessly  before  it. 

But  there  is  a  difficulty  far  worse  than  any  we  have  men- 
tioned. We  might  conquer  the  sin  which  most  easily  besets 
us,  we  might  canquer  our  inherent  evil  tendencies,  and  out- 
grow them,  if  we  really  wished  to  do  so  ;  but  the  deepest  of 
all  evils  is  a  want  of  love  for  God  and  for  goodness.  We 
know  that  we  ought  to  love  and  obey  God ;  but  our  heart  is 
alienated  from  him.  The  great  mass  of  men  are  living  away 
from  God.  They  are  not  conscious  of  his  presence,  though 
they  know  that  he  is  near  to  them.  Though  they  know 
that  his  eye  is  upon  them,  it  does  not  restrain  them  from  sin. 
Though  they  know  that  their  heavenly  Father  and  best  Friend 
is  close  at  hand,  how  seldom  do  they  pray  !  how  seldom  look 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OF   SIN.  157 

up  with  gratitude  for  all  their  mercies  and  joys  !  This  shows 
a  terrible  estrangement  of  soul  from  God.  The  veil  is  on 
their  hearts,  not  on  their  minds. 

The  question  is  sometimes  asked,  "  whether  sin  is  a  pos- 
itive or  merely  a  negative  evil."  Now,  whatever  may  be 
the  case  with  other  kinds  of  sin,  this  alienation  of  the  heart 
seems  to  us  a  very  positive  evil ;  for  it  is  an  antagonism, 
and  resistance  of  goodness.  If  the  supreme  goodness  of  God 
does  not  attract  us,  does  not  excite  our  affection,  does  not 
irresistibly  draw  us  to  him,  then  it  repels  us ;  it  makes  the 
thought  of  his  presence  a  restraint  and  burden  ;  it  makes  us 
wish  to  go  away  from  God.  The  goodness  of  God  is  so  very 
positive  a  thing,  that  we  cannot  be  indifferent  to  it ;  we  can- 
not be  neutral  in  regard  to  it.  If  we  do  not  love  it,  it  is 
disagreeable,  and  we  are  uncomfortable  in  the  thought  of  it. 
Swedenborg  relates  that  certain  wicked  persons  were  allowed 
to  enter  heaven  on  a  certain  occasion  ;  but  they  immediately 
became  almost  lifeless,  and,  from  the  torment  and  pain  in 
their  head  and  body,  prostrated  themselves  on  the  ground, 
and  writhed  like  worms  ;  but,  being  taken  and  carried  into 
hell,  became  comparatively  comfortable.  What  can  be  more 
terrible  than  the  idea  thus  conveyed  of  our  aversion  to  good- 
ness, which  makes  heaven  intolerable,  and  the  presence  of 
God  insufferable  torture  !  Can  anything  express^  more  than 
this,  the  need  of  a  change  of  heart? 

Jesus,  we  think,  asserts  a  similar  view  when  he  says,  "  He 
that  is  not  with  me  is  against  me."  "  No  man  can  serve 
two  masters ;  for  he  will  either  love  the  first  and  hate  the 
last,  or  love  the  last  and  hate  the  first."  He  will  not  be 
indifferent  to  either,  if  their  characters  and  commands  are  of 
an  opposite  kind. 

We  do  not  mean  to  say  that  we  hate  God  ;  but  we  mean  that 

there  is  something  Avithin  us,  while  our  hearts  are  not  wholly 

his,  which  makes  it  unpleasant  and  burdensome  to  think  of 

God  and  pray  to  him.     We  feel  a  certain  repugnance  to  a 

14 


158      ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

familiar  and  happy  intercourse  with  our  heavenly  Father. 
Our  prayers,  if  we  pray,  arc  formal  and  cold ;  our  hearts 
are  hard,  and  their  affections  do  not  flow  easily  upward. 

Now,  if  there  be  such  a  thing  as  a  change  of  heart,  which 
will  make  it  a  pleasure  to  pray,  a  joy  to  think  of  God  ;  which 
will  make  it  natural  to  us  to  approach  him,  and  dwell  on  the 
thought  of  his  goodness  ;  which  will  enable  us  to  see  him  in 
tho  majesty  and  sweetness  of  nature,  in  the  rise  of  empires 
or  the  death  of  an  infant,  in  the  coming  of  Christ,  and  iu 
every  good  thought  which  swells  in  our  souls,  —  then  it  is 
evident  that  this  is  what  we  need.  Let  us  dig  deep,  and 
build  our  house  upon  a  rock. 

We  shall  see  in  another  section  that  there  is  such  a 
change  of  heart  as  we  have  described.  Jesus  saves  sin- 
ners by  taking  away  the  heart  of  stone,  and  giving  a 
heart  of  flesh.  He  saw  the  whole  depth  and  extent  of 
the  disease  which  he  came  to  cure.  There  are  some 
preachers  who  do  not  know  how  great  an  evil  sin  is,  and 
would  not  know  what  to  do  for  a  penitent  and  anxious  soul 
which  really  saw  the  greatness  of  its  needs.  Thus,  when 
George  Fox  went  to  the  rector  of  his  church  to  ask  advice 
for  the  distress  of  his  soul,  he  was  told  to  amuse  himself  and 
divert  his  mind.  But  Jesus  saw  ail  the  extent  of  sin,  and 
yet  was  ready  to  encourage  and  help  the  sinner.  He  knew 
that  his  remedy  was  equal  to  the  emergency.  The  gospel  of 
Christ  can  give  to  us  love  to  God  and  love  to  man  ;  can 
soften  our  hearts  in  humility,  can  enable  us  to  fight  with 
and  conquer  even  the  hereditary  evil  of  our  organization  ; 
can  ultimately  redeem  us  from  all  evil.  This  is  the  de- 
pravity we  are  to  conquer ;  not  of  nature,  but  of  will,  and 
aim,  and  purpose. 

§  10.  Ability  and  Inability.  —  One  of  the  pivotal  points 
in  the  Orthodox  theory  of  evil  is  that  of  moral  inability. 
Indeed,  the  doctrine  of  total  depravity  seems  to  be  taught  for 
the  sake  of  this.     Total  depravity  resolves  itself,  in  the  mind 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OF   SIN.  159 

of  the  Orthodox  teacher,  into  total  inability,  and  means  that 
man,  unable  to  do  right  by  any  power  in  himself,  must  throw 
himself  wholly  and  absolutely  on  the  divine  grace.  The  se- 
cret motive  of  the  whole  Orthodox  doctrine  of  evil  is  to  lead 
through  a  sense  of  sin  to  humility,  and  at  last  to  dependence. 
Orthodoxy  here  becomes  intelligible,  so  soon  as  we  perceive 
that  its  purpose  is  not  speculative,  but  practical.  As  religion 
consists  so  greatly  in  the  sentiment  of  dependence,  it  is  a 
leading  purpose  in  the  Orthodox  system  to  produce  this 
sense  of  dependence.  That  group  of  graces  —  reverence, 
humility,  submission,  trust,  prayer  —  which  lend  such  an 
ineffable  charm  to  the  moral  nature,  which  purify  and  refine 
it  to  its  inmost  depths,  —  these  spring  almost  wholly  from  the 
sense  of  dependence  on  a  higher  and  better  being  than  our- 
selves. These  being  absent,  the  elevating  principle  is  want- 
ing ;  the  man  cannot  rise  above  himself.  There  may  be 
truth,  courage,  conscience,  purity,  but  they  are  all  stoical  and 
self-relying.  It  is  only  he  who  relies  on  a  higher  power, 
clings  to  a  higher  being,  and  draws  his  moral  life  from 
above,  who  can  ascend.  He  Avho  humbles  himself,  and  he 
only,  shall  be  exalted.  But  humility  does  not  consist  in 
looking  down,  but  in  looking  up.  It  does  not  come  from 
looking  at  our  own  meanness,  but  at  something  higher  and 
better  than  ourselves.  The  sense  of  sin  is  only  elevating 
when  connected  with  the  sight  of  a  higher  beauty  and  holi- 
ness. 

It  is,  therefore,  in  order  to  produce  a  conviction  of  abso- 
lute dependence  that  Orthodoxy  urges  so  strongly  the  doc- 
trines* of  total  depravity  and  total  inability.  A  man  will 
not  pray,  says  the  Orthodox  system,  till  he  feels  himself 
helpless.  He  will  not  seek  a  Saviour  so  long  as  he  hopes  to 
save  himself.  He  must  see  that  he  can  do  nothing  more  for 
himself;  and  then,  for  the  first  time,  he  exercises  a  real  faith 
in  God,  and  casts  himseh"  on  the  divine  mercy. 

Reasoning  in  this  way,  consciously  or  unconsciously,  Or- 


160  ORTHODOXY  :    ITS   TRUTHS    AND    ERRORS. 

thodoxy  has  built  up  its  doctrine  of  human  inability,  which 
we  will  proceed  to  state,  —  first,  however,  indicating  the  scrip- 
tural view  of  this  subject. 

Scripture  teaches  that  man  is  able  to  choose  the  right,  but 
not  always  able  to  perform  it.  He  is  free  in  his  spirit,  but 
bound  by  circumstances  of  position,  and  by  bodily  organiza- 
tion. He  is  free  to  choose,  but  not  free  to  do.  His  freedom 
is  in  effort,  not  necessarily  in  accomplishment.  He  can  al- 
ways try  ;  he  cannot  always  effect  what  he  tries. 

Thus  Jesus  says  (Matt.  26  :41),  "Watch  and  pray,  that 
ye  enter  not  into  temptation  ;  the  spirit  indeed  is  willing,  but 
the  flesh  is  weak."  And  so  Paul  says,  in  the  passage  on  this 
subject  before  referred  to  (Rom.  7  :  18),  "  To  will  is  present 
with  me,  but  how  to  perform  that  which  I  will,  I  find  not." 

Without  attempting  here  to  enter  into  the  tormented 
question  of  fate  and  freedom,  of  necessity  so  irrefragably 
demonstrated  by  the  logic  of  Edwards  and  others,  —  of  free- 
will perpetually  reasserted  by  the  intuitive  reason  in  the 
soul,  —  we  may  say  this  :  Whether  there  be  such  a  thing  as 
metaphysical  freedom  or  not,  there  is  such  a  thing  as  moral 
freedom.  In  proportion  as  man  sinks  into  the  domain  of 
nature,  he  is  bound  by  irresistible  laws.  In  proportion  as 
he  rises  into  the  sphere  of  reason,  justice,  truth,  love,  he  is 
einancipated,  and  can  direct  his  own  course.  "  Ye  shall 
know  the  truth,  and  the  truth  shall  make  you  free."  "  K 
the  Son,  therefore,  shall  make  you  free,  ye  shall  be  free 
indeed."  (John  8:32,  36.)  "Stand  fast  in  the  liberty 
wherewith  Christ  hath  made  us  free."  (Gal.  5:1.)  It  is 
therefore  true  that  only  as  we  direct  our  course  by  eternal 
laws,  we  rise  above  the  controlling  influence  of  habit,  preju- 
dice, public  opinion,  inherited  and  original  tendencies  of  the 
blood  and  brain.  According  to  Paul  (Rom.  6  :  16-22),  man 
must  be  either  the  servant  of  sin  or  the  servant  of  God. 
He  must  serve,  willingly  or  unAvillingly.  He  must  be  the 
degraded  slave  of  desire  and  selfishness,  or  the  willing,  loyal 


ORTHODOX   IDEA    OP    SIN.  161 

subject  of  truth  aud  rij,'ht.  Paradoxically  enough,  however, 
he  only  feels  free  in  these  two  cases.  For  in  these  two  states 
he  is  doing  what  he  chooses  to  do.  When  he  is  blindly  and 
willingly  following  his  lower  instincts  he  feels  free.  When 
he  is  rationally  and  freely  choosing  right,  and  doing  it,  he 
also  feels  free.  But  when  half  way  between  these  two  states, 
when  his  conscience  is  pulling  one  way  and  his  desires 
drawing  him  the  other,  when  he  is  choosing  right  and  doing 
wrong,  he  feels  himself  a  slave. 

There  are  therefore  these  three  conditions  of  the  will,  cor- 
responding to  the  Pauline  division  of  man  into  spirit,  soul, 
and  body  (1  Tim.  5  :  23)  —  a  view  of  man  which  was  held 
throughout  antiquity.  The  carnal  man  (a«^x«xo;)  is  one 
in  whom  the  earthly  appetites  are  supreme,  and  the  soul, 
{ipv/7j)  and  spirit  (.T*fu<m)  subordinate.  The  natural  man 
(^ipv/iy-o;  arOoujno;,  1  Cor.'  2  :  14)  is  one  in  whom  the  soul, 
or  central  principle,  the  finite  will,  is  supreme.  The  spiritual 
man  (^ni'evjiiuTixo;,  1  Cor.  2  :  15)  is  he  in  whom  the  infinite 
principle,  the  sense  of  eternal  truth  and  right,  is  supreme, 
lu  the  first  condition  —  that  of  the  carnal  man  —  one  is  the 
slave  of  sin,  but  without  knowing  it,  because  there  is  no  wish 
to  become  anything  dillerent.  In  the  second  state  —  that 
of  the  natural  man  (or  psychical  man)  —  the  soul  chooses 
the  good,  but  is  drawn  down  by  the  evil.  The  law  of  the 
mind  is  warring  against  the  law  of  the  members,  arid  the 
man  is  torn  asunder  by  this  conflict.  He  tries  to  do  right, 
and  does  wrong.  He  now  first*  feels  himself  a  slave  ;  yet 
he  is  in  reality  less  a  slave  than  before,  for  now  he  is  en- 
deavoring to  escape.  His  will  is  emancipated,  though  his 
habits  of  conduct,  his  habits  of  thought,  his  habits  of  feeling, 
still  bind  him  fast.  In  the  third  condition,  that  of  the  spir- 
itual man,  he  has  broken  these  chains.  He  not  only  wills 
to  do  right,  but  does  it.  His  body  shares  in  the  new  life  of 
his  soul.  He  now  is  made  free  by  the  truth  and  the  spirit 
14* 


1.62     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

from  the  service  of  evil,  aud  shares  in  "  the  glorious  liberty 
of  the  children  of  God." 

In  all  these  conditions  the  human  being  has  some  freedom, 
but  differing  in  degree  in  each.  In  the  lowest  state  he  has 
freedom  of  action,  for  he  does  what  he  wishes  to  do ;  but  he 
has  not  freedom  of  choice,  for  he  does  not  choose  at  all.  He 
acts  not  by  intelligent  choice,  but  by  blind  instinct,  habit  or 
custom.  In  the  middle  state  he  has  freedom  of  choice,  but 
not  of  action.  He  chooses  the  good,  but  performs  the  evil. 
This  is  the  condition  described  by  Ovid,  and  other  profane 
writers,  before  Paul  described  it  in  the  seventh  chapter  of 
Romans.*  But  in  the  highest  state  —  a  spiritual  condition 
—  he  has  both  freedoms  ;  he  can  both  choose  and  perform. 
The  carnal  man  seems  to  be  free,  but  is  most  thoroughly 
enslaved  of  all.  The  psychical  man  seems  to  himself  to  be 
enslaved,  but  has  begun  to  be  free.  The  spiritual  man  both 
seems  to  be  free  and  is  so.  The  apparent  freedom  of  the 
carnal  man  differs  from  the  real  freedom  of  the  spiritual 
man  in  this  —  the  spiritual  man  could  do  wrong  if  he  chose 
to  do  so,  but  chooses  to  do  right.  But  the  carnal  man  could 
not  do  right  if  he  should  choose.  A  good  man,  if  he  chose 
to  do  so,  might  lie,  and  steal,  and  drink,  and  be  profane ; 
but  a  bad  man  coidd  not,  by  choosing,  become  temperate, 
pure,  truthful,  and  honest. 

Scripture  and  experience  give,  therefore,  the  same  account 
of  human  ability  and  inability.  In  the  lowest  state  man  is 
the  servant  of  sense,  and  can  neither  will  nor  do  right.  In 
the  higher  condition  he  can  will,  but  cannot  perform ;  for 
his  ideal  aim  is  above  his  actual  power.     In  the  highest,  or 

*  Ovid.    Metam.  7  :  18. 

"  Si  possem,  sanior  essem. 
Sed  trahit  invitam  nova  vis  ;  aliudque  cupido, 
Mens  aliud  suadet,  video  meliora,  proboque, 
Deteriora  sequor." 

Sec,  also,  the  story,  in  the  Cyropaedia,  of  Araspes  and  his  two  sovll* 


ORTHODOX   IDEA    OF   SIN.  163 

regenerate,  state  he  can  botli  will  and  do.     Body,  as  well  as 
soul,  serve  tlie  spirit. 

These  are  the  truths  which  lie  at  the  basis  of  the  Ortho- 
dox doctrine  of  inability.  But  Orthodoxy,  in  its  desire  to 
aAvaken  a  sense  of  dependence,  has  pushed  them  to  an 
unreasonable  extreme.  It  asserts  that  man,  in  his  natural 
state,  before  lie  is  regenerated,  has  no  poAver  to  will  or  to  do 
right.  It  is  evident,  however,  that  all  men  have  power  to 
will  and  to  do  many  right  things.  Even  in  the  lowest  condi- 
tion, a  man  wills  and  does  much  that  is  right.  Though  the 
governing  principle  be  the  lowest  one,  he  can  yet  perform 
many  good  actions.  In  the  second  condition  also,  the  psy- 
chical man,  though  not  able  always  to  do  right,  often  suc- 
ceeds in  doing  so.  And  in  this  state  the  apostle  declares 
that  he  does  not  do  the  evil,  but  "  sin  that  dwells  in  him." 
So  long  as  his  purpose  is  right,  he  is  right. 

§  11.  Orthodox  Doctrine  of  Inability.  —  Let  us  see  what 
Orthodoxy  says  of  the  inability  of  the  unregenerate  man. 
The  Assembly's  Confession  declares  (chap.  6,  §  4),  that  by 
our  corrupt  nature  "  we  are  utterly  indisposed,  disabled, 
and  made  opposite  to  all  good,  and  wholly  inclined  to  all 
evil."  In  chap.  9,  §  3,  it  says  that  "  man,  by  his  fall  into 
a  state  of  sin,  hath  wholly  lost  all  ability  of  will  to  any 
spiritual  good  accompanying  salvation." 

This  seems  plain  enough.  It  would  justify  the  charge 
made  by  Dr.  Cox,  that  there  are  those  who  teach  that  "  a 
man  has  no  ability  to  do  his  duty,"  *•'  and  "  that,  where  the 
means  of  grace  are  abundantly  vouchsafed,  a  man  can  do 
nothing  for,  but  can  only  counteract,  his  own  salvation."  Jt 
would  also  seem  to  lay  a  fit  foundation  for  that  kind  of  Cal- 
vinistic  preaching  which,  according  to  Professor  Finney,  of 


*  See  Dr.  Cox's  Sermon  on  Regeneration,  reviewed  by  Dr.  Hodge,  in  "  £s< 
■ajB  and  Reviews." 


164    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors, 

Oberlin    (see   "Revival   Lectures"),  virtually  amounts   to 
saying,    , 

"  You  can,  find  you  can't; 
You  shall,  and  you  shan't ; 
You  will,  and  you  won't ; 
Y''ou'll  be  damned  if  you  don't." 

These  charges,  it  must  be  noticed,  are  brought  against 
Calvinism,  not  by  ua,  but  by  Presbyterian  divines,  themselves 
holding  to  this  same  Westminster  Confession. 

But  let  us  look  at  some  of  the  expositions  given  to  this 
doctrine  of  inability  by  modeiui  Orthodox  authorities. 

(a.)  The  Old  School  Presbyterians.  —  As  stated  by  one 
of  their  own  number  (Professor  Atwater,  of  Princeton  Col- 
lege, Bibliotheca  Sacra,  January,  1864),  they  hold  an  inability 
"  moral,  sinful,  and  real,"  "  irremovable  by  the  sinner's  own 
power."  He  sets  aside  the  objection  that  we  are  not  bound 
to  do  what  we  are  unable  to  do,  by  saying  that  this  applies 
to  actions  only,  not  to  sinful  dispositions.  lie  illustrates  this 
by  saying  that  an  irrepressible  disposition  to  slander  would 
be  only  so  much  more  culpable.  But  in  this  he  is  evidently 
wrong.  Such  a  habit  has  become  a  disease,  and  the  unfor- 
tunate victim  is  no  longer  accountable  for  what  he  does. 

{b.)  The  New  School  Presbyterians.  —  (Rev.  George  Duf- 
field,  in  Bibliotheca  Sacra,  July,  1863.)  Although  Dr.  Duf- 
field  objects  to  the  language  of  the  Old  School  Presbyterians  in 
denying  "  free  agency,"  and  regarding  man  "  as  destitute  of 
ability  as  a  block  of  marble,"  he  yet  declares  that  the  New 
School,  as  well  as  the  Old,  believe  that  in  the  unconverted 
state  "  man  can  do  nothing  morally  good."  Still,  he  adds, 
men  can  accept  the  offers  of  salvation  made  by  Jesus  Christ. 
5ut  he  positively  denies  that  "  man,  in  his  natural  state, 
independent  of  the  gospel  and  Spirit  of  Christ,  has  ability 
perfectly  to  obey  all  the  commandments  of  God."  We  sup- 
pose that  most  persons  would  agree  with  him  in  this  state- 
ment. 

(c.)    The  Old  School  in  Netv  England  Theology.  —  (Bib- 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OF   SIN.  165 

liotheca  Sacra,  April,  1863.  Article  by  Professor  Law- 
rence, East  Windsor,  Connecticut.)  This  writer  contends 
that  luimau  inability  is  moral,  and  not  natural  —  a  distinction 
much  dwelt  upon  by  the  Ilopkinsians,  but  rejected  by  the 
Old  School  Presbyterians.  This  system  differs  from  the 
Armiuian  or  Methodist  view  in  insisting  that  man  has  power 
enough  to  sin,  though  not  enough  to  obey. 

(<L)  HopJiinsianism.  —  (Bibliotlieca  Sacra,  July,  1862.) 
The  Hopkinsians  profess  to  contend  lor  free  agency,  in  order 
to  save  responsibility.  They  adopt  the  ideas  of  Edwards 
ou  free  agency.  But  freedom,  with  them,  consists  only  in 
choice.  Whatever  we  choose,  we  choose  freely.  The  carnal 
man  is  as  free  in  choosing  evil  as  the  spiritual  man  in  choos- 
ing good.  All  real  freedom  in  this  system  disappears  in  a 
juggle  of  words. 

The  result  of  this  examination  will  show  that  the  great 
body  of  the  Orthodox,  of  all  schools,  continues  to  deny  any 
real  ability  in  the  unregenerate  man  to  do  the  will  of  God. 
They  do  not  sai/  that  "  man  has  no  power  to  do  his  duty," 
but  that  is  the  impression  leit  by  their  teaching.  The  dis- 
tinction between  natural  and  moral  inability  is  insufficient ; 
for  it  is  as  absurd  to  say  that  a  man  is  unable  not  to  sin, 
when  you  only  mean  that  he  chooses  to  sin,  as  it  would  be  to 
say,  when  invited  to  eat  your  dinner,  "  1  am  unable  to  eat," 
mear.ing  only  that  you  were  unwilling.  Besides,  if  inability 
is  moral,  il  is  in  the  will,  and  not  in  the  nature,  and  so  is 
not  naturii'.  depravity  at  all.  It  is  also  making  God  unjust 
to  teach  thav  he  considers  us  guilty  for  a  misfortune.  If  we 
derive  a  corrupted  nature  from  Adam,  that  is  our  misfortune, 
and  not  our  fault,  and  God  owes  us  not  anger,  but  pity. 
Instead  of  punishing  us,  he  should  compensate  us  for  this 
disaster. 

Therefore  the  unreason,  the  want  of  logic,  and  the  absence 
of  any  just  view  of  God,  appear,  more  or  less,  throughout 
these  statements.     For  where  there  is  no  ability,  there  can 


166     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

be  no  guilt.  Just  as  soon  as  man  ceases  to  have  the  power 
to  do  right,  he  ceases  to  have  the  power  to  do  wrong.  Ina- 
bility and  guilt,  wliich  are  connected  by  all  these  creeds, 
logically  exclude  each  other.  If  our  nature  is  incapable  of 
doing  good,  then  it  is  incapable  of  committing  sin.  One  or 
the  other  must  be  given  up.  Keep  which  you  will,  but  you 
cannot  keep  both.  We  may  be  totally  depraved  by  our 
nature  ;  but  then  we  cease  to  be  sinners,  and  cease  to  be 
guilty.  Or  we  may  be  going  wholly  wrong,  and  so  be  sinful, 
but  then  we  have  the  power  of  going  right. 

This  is  the  inconsistency  in  almost  all  Orthodox  systems. 
By  dwelling  so  much  on  human  weakness,  they  destroy  at 
last  the  sense  of  responsibility. 

§  12.  Some  further  Features  of  Orthodox  TJieology  concern-' 
ing  Human  Sinfulness.  —  In  the  article  in  the  Bibliotheca 
Sacra  before  refei-red  to  (April,  1863),  by  Edward  A.  Law- 
rence, D.  D.,  Professor  at  East  AVindsor,  Connecticut,  on 
"The  Old  School  in  New  England  Theology,"  the  writer  gives 
the  following  account  of  the  doctrines  of  this  body  concerning 
sin  :  — 

"  Grod  created  man  a  holy  being.  He  was  not  merely  in- 
nocent, as  not  having  committed  sin,  not  merely  pure,  as  not 
inheriting  any  derived  evil,  but  was  positively  holy  in  his 
very  being."  This,  we  suppose,  must  mean  that  he  was  in- 
clined by  nature  to  do  right,  rather  than  wrong.  It  was  as 
natural  for  him  to  love  God  as  for  a  fish  to  swim  or  a  bird  to 
fly.  Nothing  less  than  this,  certainly,  would  deserve  to  be 
called  "  holiness  of  being." 

"  The  first  man,"  says  Professor  Lawrence,  "  was  the 
federal  head  of  this  race,  representatively  and  by  :ovenaiit, 
as  no  other  father  has  been  or  can  be  with  his  children." 
This  is  illustrated  by  the  fact  of  a  legal  corporation,  whose 
members  are  responsible  in  law  for  the  actions  of  their  agent. 

Professor  Lawrence  explains  the  belief  of  the  Old  School  in 
the  imputation  of  Adam's  sin  thus  :  It  was  not  the  personal 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OF    SIN.  167 

guilt  of  Adam  which  was  imputed  to  his  descendants,  but 
"  certain  disastrous  consequences."  They,  as  well  as  he,  be- 
came "  subject  to  temporal  and  eternal  death."  The  next 
consequence  of  Adam's  sin  we  must  give  in  Professor  Law- 
rence's own  language,  iu  order  not  to  misrepresent  him. 
"  The  first  evil  disposition  which  led  to  the  evil  choice  was  not 
only  confirmed  in  him  as  an  individual,  but  also  as  a  quality 
of  humau  nature,  and  it  reappears,  successively,  in  each  one 
of  them."  Imputation,  tiicrefore,  means  not  the  transfer  of 
guilt,  but  of  a  corrupt  nature.  "  It  is  not  a  sin  to  be  born 
sinful ;  but  the  sin  with  which  men  are  born  is  nevertheless 
sinful."  Then  follows  this  statement :,  "  We  are  strictly 
guilty  only  for  our  owu  sin  ;  but  the  sinfulness  with  which 
we  are  born  is  as  really  ours  as  if  it  originated  in  our 
own  act." 

This,  again,  is  explained  by  defining  guilt  as  liability  to 
punishment  on  account  of  the  acts  of  another,  "  as  when  the 
members  of  a  corporation  suffer  from  the  ill  management  of 
its  agent."     This  he  calls  corporate  guilt. 

The  Old  School  doctrine,  according  to  this  writer,  concern- 
ing sin,  makes  it  a  state  rather  than  an  act.  It  is  not  merely 
the  act  of  disobedience,  but  the  wrong  bias  of  the  will,  out  of 
which  the  act  proceeds.  He  thiuks  it  wrong  to  call  "  sin  a 
nature,"  for  neither  the  substance  of  the  soul,  nor  its  faculties, 
are  sinful.  The  depravity  of  nature  is  not  choice,  so  much 
as  tendency  which  leads  to  choice.  It  is  hereditary,  being 
transmitted  from  father  to  son. 

The  old  theology,  therefore,  predicates  sinfulness  of  human 
nature  ;  affirms  sin  to  be  a  wrong  state  or  bias  of  will ;  consid- 
ers it  to  be  hereditary ;  regards  new-born  infants  as  depraved, 
but  thinks  that  those  of  them  who  die  in  infancy,  before  actual 
transgression,  are  renewed  and  saved  by  the  blood  of  Christ ; 
and  considers  temporal  death  as  a  part  of  the  penalty  of  sin. 

Upon  this  statement  of  the  Old  School  doctrine,  the  foUov 
ing  criticisms  naturally  occur  :  -r— 


168    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

First.  If  original  righteousness  was  holiness  of  nature, 
and  not  ndere  innocence  ;  if  it  was  a  positive  tendency  to 
good,  and  not  merely  a  state  of  indifference  between  good 
and  evil;  then,  we  ask,  What  produced  the  fall?  What 
motive  led  to  the  commission  of  the  fii'st  sin  ?  If  the  nature 
of  the  first  man  was  holy,  there  was  nothing  in  it  which 
could  lead  him  to  sin,  and  any  external  temptation  addressed 
to  such  a  nature  must  fall  powerless  before  it.  It  would  be 
like  trying  to  tempt  a  fish  to  fly  in  the  air,  or  like  tempting 
a  bird  to  go  into  the  water.  Even  if  the  first  man  could 
have  been  induced  by  any  deception  or  external  influence  to 
commit  a  wrong  act,  this  would  not  be  sinful,  because  there 
would  be  no  sinful  motive  behind  it.  A  wrong  act  proceed- 
ing from  a  holy  nature  is  either  an  impossibility  or  a  mere 
innocent  mistake.  Our  first  criticism,  therefore,  on  the  Old 
School  doctrine  of  sin,  is,  that  it  makes  Adam's  fall  an  impos- 
sibility. 

Second.  As  regards  Adam's  federal  headship  and  the 
illustration  of  a  coi'poration,  we  say,  that  the  members  of  a 
corporation  are  not  considered  guilty  in  consequence  of  the 
acts  of  their  agent,  although  they  may  suffer  in  consequence 
of  these  acts.  If  he  commits  forgery  they  may  lose  money 
thereby,  but  no  one  would  think  of  calling  them  forgers. 
The  sin  of  a  parent  may  be  visited  upon  his  children  to  the 
third  or  fourth  generation,  but  in  their  case  it  is  neither  pun- 
ishment nor  guilt,  but  only  misfortune.  When  Professor 
Lawrence,  therefore,  says,  that  "  we  are  guilty  for  the  sinful- 
ness with  which  we  are  born,  because  it  is  really  ours,"  he 
utters  a  moral  absurdity,  and  strikes  at  the  root  of  all  moral 
distinctions.  He  says,  "  The  sinfulness  with  which  we  are 
born  is  really  ours  ;  "  but  in  what  sense  oicrs  f  Only  as  any 
congenital  disease  may  be  called  ours.  If  a  man  is  born 
with  a  tendency  to  consumption,  blindness,  lameness,  he  may 
say,  "  my  lameness,  my  near-sightedness."  But  no  one 
would  suppose  that  he  meant  thereby  to  hold  himself  respon- 


ORTHODOX    IDRA   OF   SIN.  169 

sible  for  them,  or  to  consider  himself  guilty  because  of  them. 
It  is  absurd  to  speak  of  '•'■  corporate  guilt."  The  corporate 
guilt,  for  example,  of  the  stockholders  of  a  bank,  because  of 
the  crime  of  an  absconding  teller  ! 

The  natural  objection  to  tliis  illustration  of  a  corporation 
is,  that  those  who  enter  into  a  corporation  do  it  by  a  fi-ee  act, 
and  make  themselves  voluntarily  responsible.  But  we  did 
not  consent  that  Adam  should  be  our  agent.  We  did  not 
agree  that  if  Adam  should  commit  a  single  act  of  disobedi- 
ence we  should  be  born  totally  depraved,  and  liable  to  ever- 
lasting torments  in  consequence.  Professor  Lawrence  replies, 
that  it  would  have  been  impossible  for  God  to  ask  our  con- 
sent, and  therefoi-e,  apparently  he  supposes  that  God  took  for 
granted  that  Ave  would  consent.  This  seems  to  be  no  answer 
to  the  objection.  If  it  was  impossible  for  God  to  obtain  our 
consent,  before  we  were  born,  to  incur  this  awful  danger,  he 
was  not  compelled  to  expose  us  to  it.  It  is  an  insult  to  the 
justice  of  the  Almighty  to  assume  that  he  could  have  done  so. 

Third.  Professor  Lawrence  does  not  think  it  correct  to 
say  that  "  sin  is  a  nature."  But  why  not,  if -ft  be  a  universal 
and  constant  element,  an  original  and  permanent  state  of  the 
soul?  To  say  that  human  nature  is  sinful,  but  deny  that  sin 
is  a  nature,  seems  to  be  making  a  distinction  without  a  dif- 
ference. It  is  a  disposition  to  sin  born  with,  the  child. 
Now,  say  what  we  will,  such  a  disposition  to  sin  thus  born 
with  us  is  not  guilt  but  misfortune.  A  just  God  will  not 
hold  us  responsible  for  it,  but  will  hold  himself  responsible  to 
help  us  out  of  it.  As  a  faithful  Creator,  he  is  bound  to  do 
so,  and  will  do  so. 

It  is  common  for  theologians  to  deny  all  such  assertions 
as  these  last.  They  hold  it  irreverent  to  say  that  God  owes 
anything  to  his  creatures.  They  accumulate  responsibility 
upon  man,  but  deny  responsibility  to  God.  But  in  doing 
this  they  take  from  the  Almighty  all  moral  character.  Cal- 
vinism, especially,  makes  of  the  Deity  infinite  power  and 
15 


170      ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

infinite  will.  But  no  blasphemy  is  worse  than  that  which, 
though  with  the  best  intentions,  virtually  destroys  the  moral 
character  of  the  Almighty,  reducing  him  to  an  infinite  will ; 
that  is,  making  of  him  an  infinite  tyrant.  For  the  essence  of 
tyranny  is  the  union  of  power  and  will  in  a  ruler,  who  recog- 
nizes no  obligations  towards  his  subjects. 

The  book  of  Job  seems  to  have  been  written  partly  to  re- 
fute this  sort  of  Calvinism.  The  friends  of  Job  were  Calvin- 
ists  in  this  sense.  The  sum  of  their  argument  Avas  that, 
since  God  was  all-powerful,  therefore  whatever  he  did  must 
be  right ;  and,  since  he  punished  Job,  Job  must  be  a  sinner, 
and  ought  to  confess  his  sin  whether  he  saw  it  or  not.  This 
has  been,  in  all  ages,  the  substance  of  Calvinism  —  Jewish 
Calvinism,  Mohammedan  Calvinisin,  Christian  Calvinism. 
It  declares  that  we  are  bound  to  submit  to  God,  not  because 
he  is  good,  but  because  he  is  powerful.  But  the  answer  of 
Job  to  his  friends  is  a  rebuke  to  the  same  spirit  wherever 
shown.  He  asks  them  "  if  they  will  speak  with  unfairness 
for  God,"  and  "  speak  deceitfully  for  him,"  and  "  accept  his 
person."  He  declares  that  if  he  could  find  God  he  would  go 
before  his  throne  and  defend  his  own  cause.  "  Would  he 
contend  with  me  with  his  mighty  power  ?  No  !  he  would 
have  regard  unto  me." 

This  is  the  sin  of  Calvinism,  that  it  "  accepts  the  person 
of  the  Almighty,"  assuming  that  he  has  a  right  to  do  as  he 
pleases  with  his  creatures,  and  that  they  have  no  rights 
which  he  is  bound  to  respect,  except  that  of  being  punished. 
Thus  it  destroys  the  moral  character  of  the  Almighty. 

Fourth.  Professor  Lawrence  says,  "  It  is  the  general  be- 
lief of  the  Old  School  that  those  who  die  in  infancy  before 
actual  transgression,  are  renewed  and  saved  by  the  blood  of 
Christ." 

The  power  of  infancy  is  wonderful.  It  can  even  break 
down  the  logic  of  Calvinism.  Wordsworth  was  right  in  call- 
ins  the  infant  — 


ORTHODOX   IDEA    OF   SIN.  171 

"  Mlgbty  prophet !  Soor  blest ! 
On  whom  those  truths  do  rest 
Which  we  arc  toiliug  nil  our  lives  to  find." 

Every  kind  of  theology,  however  savage  and  bitter  it  may 
be  against  adult  sinners,  sending  them  into  an  eternal  hell 
without  the  least  hesitation  or  remorse,  hesitatc^s  and  stam- 
mers when  it  comes  to  speak  of  little  children.  Even  the 
idolatrous  Jews,  sacrificing  their  children  to  Moloch  in  the 
valley  of  Hinnom,  beat  drums  to  drown  their  cries,  which 
they  could  not  bear  to  hear.  Both  schools  of  theology.  Old 
and  New,  hasten  to  say  that  infants  are  not  to  be  damned. 
But  wluj  not,  if  they  are  born  with  a  depraved  nature,  and 
die  without  being  converted?  Both  the  great  schools  of 
Presbyterian  theology  hold  to  the  doctrine  of  the  Assem- 
bly's Catechism,  which  declares  (chap.  6,  §  6),  that  "  every 
sin,  both  original  and  actual,  being  a  transgression  of  the 
righteous  law  of  God,  and  contrary  thereunto,  doth,  in  its 
own  nature,  bring  guilt  upon  the  sinner,  whereby  he  is  bound 
over  to  the  wrath  of  God."  Therefore  the  infant  who  dies 
before  he  has  exercised  repentance  and  faith  in  Christ,  is 
under  the  wrath  of  God.  Orthodoxy  does  not  allow  of  re- 
pentance in  the  other  life  :  how,  then,  can  infants  be  saved 
according  to  Orthodoxy  ?  Professor  Lawrence  can  only  re- 
ply, that  it  is  a  general  belief  that  they  will  be  saved.  The 
Catechism  declares,  less  decidedly,  that  "elect  infants"  will 
be  saved.  Dr.  Whedon  (Bibliotheca  Sacra,  April,  1862), 
on  behalf  of  the  Methodists,  says,  "  That  the  dying  infant  is 
saved,  and  saved  by  the  atonement,  all  agree."  But  how  he 
is  saved,  or  what  reason  they  have  to  think  him  saved,  ex- 
cept their  wish  to  believe  it,  no  one  can  tell.  Death,  in 
fact,  becomes  to  the  infant  a  saving  sacrament.  As  long  as 
he  lives  he  is  believed  unregenerate  and  unconverted.  As 
soon  as  he  dies  he  is  considered  ready  for  heaven.  But  he 
cannot  be  ready  for  heaven  until  he  is  regenerate ;  and  after 
death  there  is  no  such  thing  as  obtaining  a  new  heart,  and  no 


172         orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

opportunity  for  repentance.  Logically,  therefore,  the  infant 
is  converted  by  the  mere  act  of  dying.  We  presume  that  no 
Orthodox  theologians  would  assert  this ;  and  yet  we  really 
do  not  see  how  they  can  avoid  the  conclusion. 

But  why  is  it  any  worse  for  children  to  be  damned  in  con- 
sequence of  Adam's  sin  than  for  adults  to  be  damned  ?  Or- 
thodoxy assures  us  that  in  consequence  of  Adam's  sin  we  are 
born  depraved.  Dr.  Duffield,  stating  and  defending  the  doc- 
trines of  the  New  School  Presbyterian  Church  (Bibliotheca 
Sacra,  July,  1863),  says  that  Adam  subjected  his  posterity 
to  such  a  loss  that  they  are  born  without  any  righteousness, 
are  exposed  to  the  consequences  of  his  transgression,  and  all 
become  sinners  as  soon  as  they  are  capable  of  it.  He  quotes 
with  approbation  from  a  protest  of  the  New  School  minority, 
in  the  General  Assembly  of  1837  (which  he  calls  a  docu- 
ment of  great  historic  value),  an  assertion  that  "by  reason 
of  the  sin  of  Adam,  the  race  are  treated  as  if  they  had  sinned  ;  " 
and  from  another  document  of  the  same  school  which  says, 
that  "  we  are  all  born  with  a  tendency  to  sin,  which  makes 
it  morally  certain  that  we  shall  do  so."  Now,  we  do  not  see 
■why  it  is  any  worse  to  send  infants  to  hell  because  of  this 
depraved  nature,  than  to  send  grown  persons  there  who  have 
sinned  in  consequence  of  possessing  such  a  depraved  nature. 
If  it  be  said  that  adults  have  had  an  opportunity  to  repent, 
and  have  not  accepted  it,  we  reply,  that  to  the  mass  of  man- 
kind no  such  opportunity  is  offered  ;  that,  where  it  is  offered, 
no  one  has  the  power  to  accept  it,  except  he  be  one  of  the 
elect ;  and  that  at  all  events,  since  infants  are  sure  to  be 
saved,  and  a  very  large  proportion  of  adults  ai-e  very  likely 
to  be  lost,  death  in  infancy  is  the  most  desirable  thing  possible. 
According  to  this  doctrine,  child-murder  becomes  almost  a 
virtue. 

The  radical  difficulty  in  all  these  theories  consists  in  refus- 
ing to  apply  to  God  the  same  rules  of  justice  which  we  apply 
to  man.     To  do  so  implies  no  irreverence,  but  the  highest 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OF   SIN.  173 

reverence.  There  is  notluug  more  honorable  to  the  Ahnighty 
than  to  believe  him  to  be  actuated  by  the  same  great  princi- 
ples of  right  which  he  has  written  in  our  conscience  and 
heart.  Those  laws  of  eternal  justice,  so  deeply  engraven  on 
the  fleshly  tables  of  the  heart,  are  a  revelation  of  the  charac- 
ter of  God  himself.  If  we  think  to  honor  him  by  rejecting 
these  intuitions  of  the  reason,  and  by  substituting  for  this 
divine  idea  of  a  God  of  justice  that  of  a  being  of  arbitrary 
v>  ill,  who  is  under  no  obligations  to  his  creatures,  we  deeply 
dishonor  the  Almighty  and  fatally  injure  our  o\Yn  character. 
From"  this  perverted  view  of  God  comes  a  cynical  view  of 
man.  When  we  make  ivill  supreme  in  God,  we  legitimate 
all  tyranny  and  contempt  from  man  to  man.  Then  comes 
the  state  of  things  described  by  Shakespeare :  — 

"  Force  should  bo  ris'ht,  or,  rather,  right  and  wrong 
(Between  whoso  endless  jar  justice  resides) 
Should  lose  their  names,  and  so  sliould  justice  too. 
Then  cverythinjj  includes  itself  in  power, 
Power  into  will,  will  into  appetite; 
And  appetite,  a  universal  wolf, 
So  doubly  seconded  with  will  and  power, 
Must  make  perforce  a  universal  prey, 
And,  last,  eat  up  himself." 

Shakespeare,  Troilus  and  Crcssid*. 


174     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 


CHAPTER    VII. 

CONVERSION   AND   REGENERATION. 

§  1.  Orthodoxy  recognizes  only  two  Conditions  in  which  Man 
can  he  founfi.  —  Orthodoxy  knows  only  two  states  in  which 
man  can  be  found.  Man  is  either  in  the  natural  state,  and 
then  he  is  totally  depraved ;  or  he  is  in  the  supernatural 
state,  in  which  the  chain  of  sin  has  been  broken.  He  is 
either  impenitent  or  penitent,  either  unregenerated  or  regen- 
erate, unconverted  or  converted,  a  sinner  or  a  saint. 

There  is  no  gradation,  no  shading  off,  no  twilight  between 
this  midnight  gloom  and  midday  splendor.  To  the  com- 
mon eye,  and  in  the  judgment  of  their  friends  and  neighbors, 
the  people  who  enter  a  church  seem  of  all  degrees  of  good- 
ness ;  and  every  one  has  good  and  bad  qualities  mixed  up 
together  in  his  character.  But,  as  the  Orthodox  minister 
looks  at  them  from  the  pulpit,  they  instantly  fall  into  two 
classes,  and  become  "  my  impenitent  hearers,"  and  "  my  peni- 
tent hearers." 

Moreover,  it  is  assumed  that  the  distinction  between  these 
two  classes  is  so  marked  and  plain,  that  it  can  be  recognized 
by  any  one  who  will.  Orthodox  people  inquire,  "  Is  he 
pioits  ?  "  just  as  they  would  ask,  "  Is  he  married  ?  " 

Again,  the  change  from  one  state  to  the  other  is  assumed 
to  be  so  distinct  and  marked,  that  he  who  runs  can  read. 
One  may  say  to  another,  "  Where  were  you  converted?"  just 
as  they  may  say,  "  Where  did  you  go  to  college  f"  "Where 
were  you  born  ?  "  said  an  English  bishop  to  Summerfield,  the 
Methodist  preacher.  "  In  Dublin  and  Liverpool,"  he  an- 
swered.    "Were  you  born  in  ttvo  places?"  said  the  bishop. 


CONVERSION    AND    REGENERATION.  175 

'"Art    thou    a   master    in    Isfael,  aoJ    kuowest    not   these 
things?'"  replied  Sumnierfield. 

On  the  other  hand,  it  is  quite  common  among  Liberal 
Christians  to  doubt  the  reality,  or  deny  the  importance,  of 
such  cliangos  altogether.  With  them  the  Christian  life  con- 
sists, not  in  change,  but  in  progress.  In  the  Christian  course, 
Orthodoxy  lays  the  main  stress  on  the  commencement ;  Lib- 
eral Christianity,  on  the  progress.  The  one  wishes  you  to 
begin  the  journey,  without  seeming  to  care  whether  you  go 
forward :  the  other  urges  you  to  go  forward,  without  inquir- 
ing whether  you  have  begun  to  go.  According  to  one,  Chris- 
tianity is  nothing  but  a  crisis  ;  according  to  the  other,  noth- 
ing but  a  DEVELOPMENT. 

§  2.  Crisis  and  Development.  —  Is  there  any  truth  in  this 
Orthodox  view  of  man?  anything  essential,  substantial,  vital? 
And  is  there  any  formal  error?  If  there  is,  what  is  it?  Is 
Christianity  crisis  or  development,  or  both? 

Common  sense  and  the  analogies  of  common  life  must 
answer,  "  Both."  If  Christianity  is  a  life,  it  must  begin 
with  a  birth  ;  if  a  journey,  it  cannot  be  taken  except  we 
set  out;  if  an  education,  Ave  must  determine  to  commence 
the  education  ;  if  labor  in  God's  vineyard,  we  must  go  into 
the  vineyard,  and  begin.  There  are  only  two  classes  — 
those  who  are  alive,  and  those  who  are  not  alive  ;  those  who 
are  taking  the  journey,  and  those  who  have  not  yet  set  out ; 
those  who  are  studying,  and  those  who  have  not  yet  begun 
to  study ;  those  who  are  at  work  for  God,  and  those  who 
are  standing  idle.  The  distinction  into  two  classes  seems, 
therefore,  substantial  and  real.  It  does  not  follow,  to  be 
sure,  that  these  two  classes  can  be  distinguished  so  easily  by 
the  eye  of  man  ;  but  they  certainly  can  be  by  the  eye  of  God. 
Nor  does  this  primary  distinction  interfere  with  other  dis- 
tinctions and  many  degrees  of  difference  —  greater  or  less 
differences  and  degrees  of  progress,  usefulness,  goodness. 
Nor  does  it  follow  that  those  who  are  now  on  the  right  side 


176  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

may  not  change  again  to  the  wrong,  and  again  to  the  right. 
There  may  be  conversion,  and  re-conversion  ;  but  that,  at 
any  moment,  every  person  must  be  either  endeavoring  to  do 
right,  or  not  so  endeavoring,  is  evident.  This  view  is  con- 
firmed by  the  New  Testament :  "  No  man  can  serve  two 
masters." 

That  in  the  religious  life  there  should  be  both  crisis  and 
development,  accords  with  the  analogies  of  nature.  The 
seed  lies  in  the  ground  in  a  dormant  state,  perhaps  for  a  long 
period.  After  a  time  comes  a  crisis  ;  thrills  of  life  vibrate 
through  it ;  the  gervn  is  stirred  ;  it  sends  its  roots  downward  ; 
its  stalk  pierces  the  mould,  moving  upward  into  light  and 
air.  After  this  great  change,  there  comes  a  period  of  prog- 
ress and  development.  The  plant  grows ;  its  roots  multi- 
ply ;  its  stalk  ascends,  and  divides  into  leaves.  Then  there 
comes  a  second  crisis.  The  plant  blossoms.  In  the  course 
of  a  few  hours,  after  weeks  of  growth,  the  bud  bursts  into 
beautiful  petals,  surrounding  the  delicate  stamens  and  pre- 
cious pistil.  Then  there  comes  a  second  long  period  of  slow 
development.  The  petals  fall,  and  the  fruit  slowly  swells 
through  many  weeks  of  growth.  At  last  there  comes  a  day 
when  the  fruit  is  ripe.  Yesterday  it  was  not  ripe  ;  to-day  it 
is.  This  is  the  third  crisis.  And  so,  in  human  life,  long 
periods  of  development  terminate  in  critical  hours  —  the 
seeds  of  another  long  growth.  So  it  is  in  other  things  ;  so 
also  in  religion. 

§  3.  Nature  of  the  Change.  —  The  next  position  of  Ortho- 
doxy is,  that  man,  in  the  second  or  regenerate  state,  is  a 
new  creature.  It  asserts  the  change  to  be  entire  and  radical, 
and  the  difference  immense.  Not  only  the  whole  direction 
of  the  life  is  changed,  but  the  motive  power  is  different,  and 
the  spirit  diffei'ent.  Instead  of  ambition,  there  is  content ; 
in  the  place  of  sensitive  vanity,  there  comes  humility ;  in- 
stead of  anxiety,  trust  in  God.  The  burden  of  sin  is  taken 
away  ;  the  sense  of  our  unworthiness  no  longer  torments  us  ; 


CONVERSION    AND    REGENERATION.  177 

for  God  has  forgiven  our  sins.  Duty  no  longer  seems  ardu- 
ous and  difficult ;  for  there  is  joy  in  doing  anything  for  the 
sake  of  God.  The  law  is  written  in  the  heart.  We  are 
born  into  a  new  life,  the  principle  of  which  is  faith.  "  The 
life  I  now  live  in  the  flesh,  I  live  by  faith  in  the  Son  of  God." 
This  faith  enables  us  to  see  God  as  he  is,  not  as  a  stern  King, 
or  a  distant  Power,  or  an  abstract  Law,  but  as  a  Friend, 
Father,  watchful  Providence,  surrounding  Love,  inflowing 
Life  ;  Source  from  which  we  are  always  coming,  and  towards 
■which  we  are  always  tending.  This  life  of  faith  makes  all 
things  new.  Old  things  have  passed  away,  and  the  outward 
■world  is  fresh  as  on  the  first  morning  of  creation.  Our 
inward  and  outward  life  are  both  new.  We  have  new  con- 
victions, new  aflfectious,  new  aims,  new  hopes,  new  joys. 
Nature  is  new,  life  is  new,  the  Bible  is  new,  the  future  world 
is  new.  Such  and  so  great  is  the  change  which  Orthodoxy 
assumes  as  the  result  of  conversion. 

§  4.  Its  Reality  and  Importance.  —  And  the  experience  of 
the  whole  Church,  the  biographies  of  the  saints  in  every 
denomination,  assure  us  of  the  substnntial  truth  of  this  de- 
scription. Even  in  churches .  which  are  not  Orthodox,  — 
churches  like  our  own,  which  insist  more  upon  development 
than  upon  crisis,  —  observation  verifies  this  description. 
Even  those  who  do  not  expect  such  a  change,  nor  believe  in 
it,  often  come  to  it  unexpectedly.  In  the  course  of  each  one's 
experience  as  a  Christian  minister,  though  he  may  never 
have  insisted  on  the  importance  of  sudden  changes,  and  though 
he  may  be  no  revival  preacher,  he  must  have  known  numer- 
ous instances  of  those  who  seem  to  have  passed  from  death 
to  life  in  the  course  of  a  day  or  an  hour.  And  is  not  this 
change,  either  sudden  or  gradual,  that  which  makes  Chris- 
tianity a  gospel  ?  It  is  the  good  news,  not  of  a  future  and 
distant  heaven,  but  of  a  present  heaven,  —  a  heaven  not  out- 
■ward,  but  inward  ;  a  present  salvation  from  the  power  of 
sin  ;  a  present  relief  from  the  sense  of  guilt ;  a  present  joy 


178     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

and  peace  in  believing  ;  happiness  in  serving  God  ;  sympathy 
and  good-will  to  man,  instead  of  envy  and  uncharitableness ; 
peace  with  God,  with  man,  with  ourselves,  with  our  condi- 
tion and  circumstances. 

That  such  a  state  is  possible  for  every  human  being  who 
desires  it,  is  the  good  news  which  Christ  brings  ;  and  the 
experience  of  ten  thousand  times  ten  thousand  grateful 
hearts  declares  that  it  is  a  reality. 

§  5.  Is  it  the  Work  of  God,  or  of  the  3Ian  himself?  Or- 
thodox Difficidty.  —  But  now  comes  a  difficulty  in  the  Ortho- 
dox statement.  Orthodoxy  declares  that  this  regenerate 
state  is  the  result  of  faith,  not  of  works  ;  and  that  faith  is  the 
gift  of  God ;  and  herein  Orthodoxy  follows  the  Scripture. 
Yet  Orthodoxy  calls  upon  us  to  repent  and  be  converted, 
that  our  sins  may  be  blotted  out ;  and  herein  likewise  Ortho- 
doxy follows  the  Scripture.  Is,  then,  conversion  an  experi- 
ence, or  is  it  an  action?  Is  it  something  God  gives,  or 
something  which  he  commands  ?  Is  it  a  duty  to  be  done,  or 
a  gift  to  be  received?  Is  it  submission  to  his  will,  or  joy  in 
his  love?  a  new  life  of  obedience,  or  a  new  heart  of  faith? 
If  it  is  submission,  then  we- can  all  change  our  hearts  at 
once,  and  make  ourselves  love  God  and  love  man.  But  who 
can  love  by  an  effort  of  the  will?  Yet,  if  the  new  life  is  a 
gift,  then  we  have  no  power  to  procure  it,  and  can  only  wait 
till  God  sees  fit  to  send  it ;  and  how,  then,  can  we  be  called 
upon  to  be  converted? 

Here  is  a  difficulty  which  it  seems  to  us  Orthodoxy  does 
not  solve  ;  and  yet  we  think  that  a  solution  is  to  be  found  in  a 
veiy  simple  distinction,  which,  like  all  other  true  and  real 
distinctions,  throws  light  on  many  other  difficulties. 

§  6.  Solved  hy  the  Distinction  between  Conversion  and  He- 
generation. —  The  distinction  of  which  we  speak  is  betAveen 
repentance  or  conversion  on  the  one  side,  and  regeneration 
or  a  new  life  on  the  other  side.  Repentance  or  conversion 
consists  in  renouncing  all  sin,  and  resolving  to  forsake  it ; 


CONVERSION    AND    RKGENERATION.  179 

in  turning  to  God,  with  the  purpose  of  submitting  to  his  will 
and  obeying  his  law.  This  conversion  or  repentance  is  an 
act  proceeding  from  the  will,  and  in  obedience  to  the  con- 
science. This  is  what  God  commands,  and  what  we  can  and 
ought  to  do.  Every  conscientious  person,  every  person  who 
is  endeavoring  to  do  right  aud  is  ready  to  act  up  to  his  light, 
is  a  converted  person.  Every  one  who  hates  his  sins,  resists 
temptation,  watches  aud  prays  against  it,  is  a  penitent  person. 
This  is  the  great,  broad  distinction  betAveen  man  and  man. 
This  divides  all  men  into  two  classes  —  those  who,  in  their 
will  and  purpose,  are  for  God,  truth,  and  I'ight ;  and  those 
who,  because  they  are  not /or  God,  are  really  against  him. 

But,  besides  this  broad  distinction,  there  is  another  secon- 
dary distinction  —  a  distinction  among  those  who  are  con- 
scientiously endeavoring  to  do  God's  will.  Among  the 
converted  there  are  two  classes  —  the  regenerate  and  the 
unregenerate.  A  man  may  be  converted,  and  not  be  regen- 
erate ;  for  a  man  may  repent  of  his  sin  and  turn  towards 
God,  and  yet  not  have  the  life  of  love  and  joy  which  we 
have  described. 

He  is  under  law,  not  under  grace.  He  is  struggling  to  do 
right,  but  is  not  borne  forward  on  a  joyful  tide-Avave  of  love. 

§  7.  3Ien  may  be  divided,  religiously,  into  three  Classes,  not 
two.  —  If  this  be  so,  we  may  divide  men  into  three  classes, 
and  not  into  two.  The  first  class  is  of  those  who  are  neither 
converted  nor  regenerate  ;  the  second,  who  are  converted, 
but  not  regenerate  ;  the  third,  who  are  converted,  and  also 
regenerate.  The  first  are  like  the  prodigal  in  the  parable,  — 
living  without  God  ;  the  second,  like  the  hired  servants  in 
the  same  story,  —  serving  God  for  wages ;  the  third  are 
sous,  serving  from  love,  ever  with  their  Father,  and  all  that 
he  has  is  theirs.  The  motive  of  the  first  class  is  selfish  will, 
selfish  pleasure  ;  the  motive  of  the  second  is  duty ;  that  of 
the  third,  love.  The  first  are  without  law,  the  second  un- 
der law,  the  third  under  grace.     And  so  we  might  multiply 


180  ORTHODOXY  :    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

distinctions.  But  is  it  not  clear  to  common  observation,  that 
this  threefold  classification  meets  the  facts  of  life  better  than 
the  other?  There  are  three  degrees  of  character.  There  is 
the  worldly  man,  who  is  just  as  good  or  bad  as  society 
around  him  leads  him  to  be  ;  whose  virtues  result  merely 
from  a  happy  organization,  or  fortunate  influences,  but  who 
has  no  principle  of  goodness,  no  purpose  of  righteousness,  no 
serious  aim  in  life.  Then  there  is  the  conscientious  man, 
who  means  to  live,  and  does  live,  by  a  standard  of  morality  ; 
who  has  a  serious  aim,  but  who  is  not  yet  deeply  and  joy- 
fully religious  ;  whose  religion,  at  any  rate,  is  hard  work, 
not  confiding,  child-like  faith.  And  tlien  there  is  the  Chris- 
tian believer,  who  has  begun  to  live  from  faith  ;  who  begins 
to  feel  a  higher  life  pouring  into  his  heart  from  on  high ; 
who  has  help  and  strength  from  above.  From  his  heart  the 
burden  has  been  lifted,  and  he  has  become  again  as  a  little 
child.  He  knows  how  to  pray  the  prayer  of  faith.  He  may 
not  be  so  very  much  better  than  the  other  in  outward  char- 
acter ^  but  he  has  the  principle  within  him  which  will  make 
all  things  new,  sooner  or  later. 

The  New  Testament  confirms  this  view  of  a  threefold 
division.  We  saw,  in  our  last  chapter,  that  the  apostle 
Paul,  who  considers  human  nature  to  consist  of  three  ele- 
ments, —  spirit,  soul,  and  body,  —  divides  mankind  into  the 
carnal  man,  the  natural  (psychical  or  soulish)  man,  and  the 
spiritual  man.  The  carnal  man  is  he  in  whom  the  bodily 
instincts  and  appetites  are  supreme.  "  He  is  not  subject  to 
the  law  of  God,  neither  indeed  can  be."  The  natural  man 
is  he  in  whom  the  soul  is  supreme :  he  is  neither  carnal  on 
one  side,  nor  spiritual  on  the  other.  "  He  cannot  receive 
the  things  of  the  Spirit  of  God ; "  yet  he  is  not  in  opposition 
and  hostility  to  them,  like  the  carnal  man,  whose  mind  is 
enmity  against  God. 

Still  more  plainly  does  the  apostle  indicate  the  distinction 
when  speaking  of  those  who  are  without  law,  those  who  are 


CONVERSION    AND   REGENERATION.  181 

under  law,  and  those  who  are  free  from  law  and  above  it. 
The  first  state  he  describes  in  such  words  as  these  :  "  I  was 
alive  without  the  law  once "  —  the  glad,  natural  life  and 
freedom  before  conscience  is  developed.  But  conscience  does 
awake  in  all :  "  The  commandment  came,  sin  revived,  and 
I  died."  When  man  sees  that  he  ought  to  serve  God,  yet 
continues  to  serve  the  flesh  and  the  world,  he  is  spoken  of  as 
dead  in  sin  ;  for  all  the  principle  of  progress  ceases.  .  But  if 
he  does  endeavor  to  do  right,  then  Paul  speaks  of  hiui  as 
undtr  laic,  and  on  his  way  to  a  higher  state.  That  higher 
state  he  speaks  of  as  being  "  delivered  from  the  law,  to  serve 
in  newness  of  spirit,  and  not  in  oldness  of  letter." 

Thus  we  see  that  all  religious  experiences  coincide.  The 
experience  of  the  apostle  Paul  is  exactly  the  same,  iu  its 
essentials,  with  that  of  every  soul,  however  humble,  that 
begins  and  goes  forward  in  the  Christian  life. 

If  this  distinction  between  conversion  and  regeneration  be 
correct,  it  removes  the  difficulty  in  the  Orthodox  statement. 

§  8.  Difference  between  Conversion  and  Regeneration.  — 
Conversion  is  an  act,  regeneration  an  experience.  "  Turn 
ye,  turn  ye  ;  for  why  will  ye  die  ?  "  is  the  command  of  the 
Old  Testament.  "  Repent,  and  be  converted,  that  your  sins 
may  be  blotted  out ; "  "  Repent,  and  be  baptized,  and  ye 
shall  receive  the  gift  of  the  Holy  Ghost,"  is  the  command  of 
the  New  Testament.  It  is  a  duty  to  repent ;  but  to  become 
regenerate  is  not  a  duty  :  that  is  a  gift,  to  be  received  after- 
wards. God  commands  conversion :  he  bestows  regenera- 
tion. Submission  is  an  act  of  our  own  :  faith  is  the  gift  of 
God.  A  change  of  outward  life  and  conduct  we  can  accom- 
plish ourselves  ;  at  least,  we  can  endeavor  to  accomplish  it ; 
but  the  change  of  heart  God  himself  will  bestow. 

Conversion,  a  turning  round,  is  necessarily  instantaneous  : 
it  is  a  change.      But  regeneration,  or  reception   of  divine 
Love,  is  a  state,  not  sudden,  but  passing  by  gradations  into 
a  deeper  and  deeper  life  of  faith  and  joy. 
16 


182  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS    AND    ERRORS. 

So,  too,  conversion  may  be  repeated :  "we  may  often  find 
that  we  have  again  turned  round,  and  are  going  the  wrong 
way.  But  the  inflow  of  life,  when  begun,  cannot  be  begun 
again.  When  God  has  touched  the  heart  with  his  love,  it  is 
forever  lifted  by  that  divine  experience  beyond  the  region 
of  mere  law.     We  can  never  forget  it.     These  are  the 

"  Truths  which  wake 

To  perish  never; 
Which  neither  listlessness  nor  mad  endeavor, 

Nor  man  nor  boy, 
Nor  aught  that  is  at  enmity  with  joy, 
Can  utterly  abolish  or  destroy." 

And  herein  lies  the  basis  of  the  truth  in  the  doctrine  of  the 
"  perseverance  of  saints." 

§  9.  Unsatisfactory  Attitude  of  the  Orthodox  Church. — 
We  cannot  but  think  the  attitude  of  Orthodoxy  towards  this 
part  of  Christianity  to  be  singularly  unsatisfactory  and  ineffi- 
cient. The  work  of  the  Church,  all  admit,  is  to  convert  the 
world  to  God,  and  so  save  it  from  the  power  and  evil  of  sin. 
But  if  this  is  a  work  which  the  Church  has  to  do,  it  ought 
surely  to  have  some  fixed  method  or  rule  by  which  to  act. 
It  should  not  be  a  matter  of  accident  whether  it  can  do  its 
work  or  not.  It  should  not  be  in  doubt,  every  day,  as  to 
the  success  to  come  from  its  efforts.  If  its  work  is  to  make 
men  Christians,  it  ought  to  know  how  to  do  it,  be  able  to  do 
it,  and  know  when  it  is  done.  Such  is  the  case  with  all 
other  work.  If  a  man  is  to  build  a  house,  he  does  not  bring 
together  his  materials,  hire  his  carpenters  and  masons,  and, 
when  all  are  on  the  ground,  sit  down  with  them,  and  wait  for 
some  emotion  or  interior  change  by  Avhich  they  will  be  ena- 
bled to  go  on  and  do  their  work.  If  we  are  mechauics, 
merchants,  lawyers,  physicians,  teachers,  we  do  not  wait  for 
a  revival  before  we  can  properly  fulfil  our  engagements.  It 
is  only  in  the  Avork  of  converting  the  world  to  God  —  the 
greatest  and  most  important  of  all  —  that  such  a  strange 
system  is  adopted.      We  are  told  to   put   ourselves  in  the 


CONVERSION    AND    RKGKNERATION.  183 

proper  place,  namely,  the  Cliurch  ;  collect  our  materials,  that 
is,  the  means  of  grace  ;  and  then  Ave  are  to  wait  until,  some- 
how or  other,  we  may  be  able  to  get  religion.  Religion  is 
made  a  spasm,  a  struggle,  an  agony  —  not  a  regular  work, 
not  a  steady  growth.  Everything  about  it  is  uncertain  and 
tentative.  No  one  knows  when  he  will  become  a  Christian, 
but  hopes,  some  time  or  other,  that  he  shall  be  made  one. 
The  common  thought,  produced  by  the  common  Orthodox 
system  ot"  preaching,  wits  expressed  once  in  a  public  meeting 
by  Henry  Clay.  "  I  am  not,"  he  said,  "  a  Christian.  I  am 
sorry  I  am  not.  I  wish  I  were.  I  hope  that,  some  day,  I 
shall  be."  He  did  not  mean  by  this  to  say  that  he  was  an 
unbeliever ;  but  he  had  adopted  the  helpless,  passive  system 
by  which  he  was  taught  that  he  had  nothing  to  do  but  wait 
till  some  great  change  should  take  place  in  his  soul. 

Out  of  this  way  of  thought  comes  the  revival  system  ; 
which  is  a  curious  blending  of  machinei'y  and  expectation, 
of  adroit  and  careful  management  with  reliance  on  some 
great  inspiration.  Crisis  and  development  are  to  be  expected, 
no  doubt ;  but  Ave  do  not  set  a  trap  to  catch  the  Spring.  It 
is  ours  to  plant  and  to  Avater,  but  it  is  God's  to  give  the 
increase.     That,  therefore,  should  be  left  to  him. 

The  revival  system  is  Arminianism  grafted  on  Calvinism. 
It  is  an  attempt  to  unite  the  belief  that  man  is  wholly  passive 
in  conversion,  and  is  not  able  to  prepare  himself  thereunto, 
with  the  opposite  doctrine  that  by  a  use  of  means  he  can 
become  a  Christian.  It  is  an  attempt  to  unite  the  Calvinistic 
article  that  God,  Avhen  he  chooses,  calls  those  he  has  predes- 
tined to  eternal  life,  Avith  the  attempt  to  make  him  choose 
our  time  and  Avay.  Such  a  system,  disjointed  at  its  centre, 
must  necessarily  work  badly,  and  result  in  an  alternation  of 
feverish  heats  and  aguish  chills.  To  carry  on  the  Avork  of 
the  Church  by  revivals  is  as  unreasonable  as  it  would  be  to 
carry  on  a  school,  or  a  cotton  factory,  by  a  revival  system  — 
alternations  of  violent  study  and  work,  foUoAved  by  relapses 
into  indolence  and  sloth. 


184     ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

The  Church  of  Rome  has  a  great  advantage  over  Prot- 
estant Orthodoxy  in  this  respect.  It,  too,  admits  revivals, 
and  has  its  periods  of  extraordinary  attention  to  religion.  But 
there  is  this  great  difference.  It  does  not  depend  on  them 
for  creating  Christianity  in  the  soul ;  it  uses  them  only  for 
increasing  its  warmth  and  power.  In  the  Roman  Church 
every  baptized  person  is  a  Christian  so  long  as  he  does  not 
continue  in  mortal  sin,  but  by  the  regular  use  of  the  sacra- 
ments preserves  his  Christian  life.  ■  The  essential  work  of 
the  Church  is  done  by  its  regular  methods  —  by  baptism, 
confession,  and  its  ritual  service.  In  the  Church  of  Rome, 
all  connected  with  it  are  Christians,  and  in  the  way  of  salva- 
tion. In  Protestant  Orthodox  churches,  if  any  of  those  born 
and  brought  up  in  it  are  Christians,  it  is,  so  far  as  they  are 
concerned,  a  happy  accident. 

All  this  shows  something  wrong  in  the  common  theory  of 
conversion.  Every  one  in  a  Christian  community  who  de* 
sires  to  be  a  Christian  ought  to  be  able  to  become  one. 
Christianity  is  a  gospel,  because  it  opens  the  kingdom  of 
heaven  to  all.  The  call  of  the  Church  at  the  beginning  was 
to  follow  Christ.  Any  one  who  was  willing  to  follow  Christ 
was  baptized  at  once,  and  became  a  Christian.  No  one 
waited  till  he  should  experience  some  remarkable  interior 
change,  or  some  influence  of  the  Holy  Ghost.  The  promise 
at  first  was,  that  whosoever  became  a  Christian  should  receive 
the  Holy  Ghost  afterwards.  Spiritual  influences  were  not 
the  condition  of  Christianity,  but  the  result  of  Christianity. 

One  bad  consequence  of  the  Orthodox  idea  is  discourage- 
ment on  the  one  side,  and  spiritual  pride  on  the  other. 
Those  who  are  not  converted  are  discouraged,  and  deprived 
of  the  comforts  of  Christian  faith.  Those  who  think  they 
have  been  converted  are  satisfied  with  this  past  experience, 
and  believe  themselves  Christians  on  the  strength  of  it. 
Because  some  spiritual  commotion  took  place  in  their  souls 
at  a  certain  time  and  place,  they  consider  themselves  chil- 


CONVERSION    AND    REGENERATION.  185 

dren  of  God  aud  heirs  of  his  favor,  though  iu  their  daily 
lives  they  may  show  little  proof  of  practical  Christianity. 
And  the  result  of  this,  again,  is  a  professed  distrust,  by  the 
majority  of  sensible  men,  of  such  conversions.  Men  of  the 
world  do  not  find  that  professed  Christians  are  better  than 
themselves.  Often,  indeed,  church  members  arc  not  so  just, 
honest,  manly,  or  truthful  as  those  who  make  no  claim  to 
religion.  Aud  the  reason  is  simply  this  —  that  they  have 
been  taught  to  believe  that  the  essence  of  Christianity  does 
not  consist  in  righteousness,  but  in  certain  religious  experi- 
ences. 

§  10.  The  Essential  lliing  for  3Ian  is  to  repent  and  he 
converted ;  that  is,  to  make  it  his  Purpose  to  obey  God  in  all 
Things.  —  As  far  as  man  is  concerned,  repentance  is  the  one 
thing  needful.  But  by  repentance  we  do  not  mean  sorrow 
or  contrition,  but  simpFy  turning  round  whenever  we  are 
going  wrong,  and  beginning  at  once  to  go  right.  This  is 
something  in  every  man's  power,  and  this  makes  him  a 
Christian  ;  this  gives  him  a  claim  to  all  the  promises  and 
hopes  of  the  gospel  here  aud  hereafter.  It  Avould  seem 
that  there  need  be  no  doubt  us  to  the  nature  of  repentance 
while  the  parable  of  the  prodigal  sou  stands  in  the  Bible. 
That  divine  story  gives  us  the  whole  theory  of  repentance 
and  regeneration  —  repentance  being  that  which  comes  from 
man,  regeneration  that  which  is  given  by  God.  When  the 
prodigal  son  was  aware  of  his  sin  aud  sorrow,  and  said,  "  I 
will  arise,  and  go  to  my  father ; "  and  when  he  arose,  aud 
went  to  his  father,  and  confessed  his  sin  aud  need,  then  ho 
bad  repented.  It  was  simply  going  to  his  father  with  the 
purpose  of  obedience.  And  when  the  father  received  iiim, 
not  with  reproach,  but  with  pardon  and  joy,  then  he  was 
born  again,  introduced  into  a  new  life,  into  the  peace,  and 
love,  and  Ireedom  of  his  own  home. 

*'  One  thing  is  needful,"  said  Jesus  ;  that  is,  to  sit  at  the 
feet  of  the  Master,  to  follow  him,  to  become  his  disciple. 
16* 


186    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

That  is  all  we  have  to  do  ;  then  we  are  safe.  We  can  trust 
God  to  do  his  part  if  we  do  ours.  He  will  give  us  his  Holy- 
Spirit  ;  he  will  give  us  a  new  heart ;  he  will  put  his  peace 
and  strength  into  our  souls.  It  is  not  necessary  to  be 
anxious,  or  to  be  inspecting  our  feelings  to  see  if  we  are 
feeling  right.  All  such  introspection  is  unnecessary  if  we 
have  faith  in  God  and  his  promises.  We  are  Christians  just 
as  long  as  we  are  obeying  God  and  following  Christ.  When 
we  find  oui-selves  disobedient,  selfish,  going  wrong,  then  the 
one  thing  needful  is  to  repent  and  be  converted.  We  are  to 
come  back  to  our  duty. 

The  general  impression  in  Orthodox  churches,  resulting 
from  the  preaching,  is,  that  not  much  is  gained  by  doing 
one's  duty  unless  one  is  regenerate.  Doing  our  duty  does 
not  make  us  Christians,  does  not  save  the  soul ;  so,  why  be 
particular  in  doing  more  than  others,  or  being  better  than 
others?  Orthodox  congregations  believe  in  the  new  life,  but 
not  in  obedience  as  its  necessary  antecedent. 

Unitarians,  on  the  other  hand,  believe  in  obedience,  but 
have  little  faith  in  a  higher  life  as  attainable  here.  Hence 
a  Unitarian  congregation  usually  consists  of  intelligent,  vir- 
tuous, well-meaning  people,  but  destitute  of  enthusiasm,  and 
with  little  confidence  in  the  new  birth  or  religious  life. 

Unitarians  believe  in  obedience  as  the  one  thing  needful ; 
and  in  this  they  are  right.  But  they  are  wrong  in  not  ex- 
pecting the  influences  which  God  is  always  ready  to  give, 
which  change  the  heart,  and  fill  it  with  a  peace  passing 
understanding,  which  make  duties  easy,  which  fill  life  with 
joy,  and  take  the  sting  from  death.  The  Orthodox  believe 
in  all  these  higher  emotions  and  states  of  the  soul,  but  un- 
fortunately do  not  believe  in  obedience  as  the  one  thing 
needful.  They  think  that  some  emotional  transaction  in  the 
soul  is  the  one  thing  needful. 

§  11.  Regeneration  is  God's  Work  in  the  Soul.  Exami- 
nation of  the  Classical  Passage^  or  conversation  of  Jesus  with 


CONVERSION    AND    REGENERATION.  187 

ificodemus,  —  In  the  third  chapter  of  Johu  we  have  the  con- 
versation which  has  been  made  the  basis  of  the  doctrine  of 
the  new  birth. 

In  this  conversation  of  Jesus  with  Nicodemus  we  have 
the  old  argument,  which  is  always  being  renewed,  between- 
the  letter  and  the  spirit,  between  knowledge  and  insight, 
between  routine  and  genius,  ceremony  and  inspiration,  the 
past  and  the  future,  the  goodness  of  habit  and  the  holiuesii 
born  out  of  the  living  vision  of  good.  In  fact  this  little  dia- 
logue may  be  considered  as  a  renewal,  ou  a  higher  plane,  of 
tfe«i  picture  given  us  by  Luke  of  the  boy  Jesus  in  the  temple 
talking  with  the  doctors. 

Tlie  common  doctrine  of  the  Orthodox  churches  about  this 
chapter  is,  that  Jesus  teaches  here  that  no  man  can  be  a 
Christian  or  a  good  man  unless  he  passes  through  some 
mysterious  experience,  usually  sudden,  of  which  he  must  be 
conscious,  Avhich  gives  him  a  certain  definite  series  of  very 
deep  feelings.  First,  he  must  feel  very  deeply  that  he  is  a 
sinner ;  then  that  he  cannot  by  any  effort  of  his  own  become 
different ;  thirdly,  that  unless  God  makes  him  different,  he 
never  can  be  saved ;  and  lastly,  he  must  feel  that  God  will 
change  his  heart,  and  save  him.  Having  passed  through 
this  kind  of  experience,  it  is  assumed  that  he  is  "  born 
again  ;  "  that  he  is  a  Christian  ;  that  he  is  a  new  ci*eature  ; 
that  he  has  a  new  heart ;  that  if  he  dies  now,  he  will  go  to 
heaven  ;  whereas,  if  he  had  died  before,  he  would  have  gone 
to  hell.  It  is  also  Orthodox  to  believe  that  a  man  can  do 
nothing  himself  to  produce  this  change  of  heart,  or  facili- 
tate it. 

A  very  interesting  book  was  published  not  long  ago,  writ- 
ten by  Miss  Catherine  Beecher,  in  which  she  describes  the 
sufferings  caused  in  her  ow-n  experience  by  this  theory  of 
regeneration.  Her  father  fully  believed  in  it,  and  thought  it 
necessary  to  carry  all  his  children  through  it  somehow  or 
other.     Their  conversions,  to  be  sure,  were  not  all  quite  in 


188    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

rule  ;  especially  that  of  Henry  seems  to  have  been  a  little 
abnormal,'  if  we  may  trust  an  account  given  by  himself  in  an 
article  on  the  dissolution  of  the  Bowdoin  Street  Church  and 
congregation,  Boston,  of  which  his  father  was  the  first  min- 
ister. The  description  is  so  suggestive  that  we  will  quote 
the  passage :  — 

"  If  somebody  will  look  in  the  old  records  of  Hanover 
Street  Church  about  1829,  they  will  find  a  name  thex-e  of  a 
boy  about  fifteen  years  old,  who  was  brought  into  the  Church 
on  a  sympathetic  wave,  and  who  well  iNsmembers  how  cold 
and  almost  paralyzed  he  felt  while  the  committee  questioned 
him  about  his  '  hope '  and  •■  evidences,'  which  upon  review 
amounted  to  this  —  that  the  son  of  such  a  father  ought  to  be 
a  good  and  pious  boy.  Being  tender-hearted  and  quick  to 
respond  to  moral  sympathy,  he  had  been  caught  and  inflamed 
in  a  school  excitement,  but  Avas  just  getting  over  it  when 
summoned  to  Boston  to  join  the  church  !  Ou  the  morning 
of  the  day,  he  went  to  church  without  seeing  anything  he 
looked  at.  He  heard  his  name  called  from  the  pulpit  among 
many  others,  and  trembled ;  rose  up  with  every  emotion 
petrified  ;  counted  the  spots  on  the  carpet ;  looked  piteously 
up  at  the  cornice ;  heard  the  fans  creak  in  the  pews  near 
him ;  felt  thankful  to  a  fly  that  lit  on  his  face,  as  if  some- 
thing familiar  at  last  had  come  to  break  an  awful  trance ; 
heard  faintly  a  reading  of  the  articles  of  faith  ;  wondered 
whether  he  should  be  struck  dead  for  not  feeling  more  — • 
whether  he  should  go  to  hell  for  touching  the  bread  and 
wine  that  he  did  not  dare  to  take  nor  to  refuse  ;  spent  the 
morning  service  uncertain  whether  dreaming,  or  out  of  the 
body,  or  in  a  trance ;  and  at  last  walked  home  crying,  and 
wishing  he  knew  what,  now  that  he  was  a  Christian,  he 
should  do,  and  how  he  was  to  do  it.  Ah,  well ;  there  is  a 
world  of  things  in  children's  minds  that  groAvn-up  people  do 
not  imagine,  though  they,  too,  once  were  young  !  " 

Now,  if  his  state  of  mind,  thus  described,  had  been  at 


CONVERSION    AND    REGENERATION.  189 

that  time  exposed  and  told,  it  would  uot  have  been  thought 
a  very  sound  Orthodox  experience.  But  in  reality  the  boy 
was  at  that  very  time  as  good  a  Christian  for  a  boy  as  he  is 
now  for  a  man.  But  Miss  Beecher,  in  the  book  referred  to, 
tells  us  that  when  one  of  her  other  brothers  was  striving  in 
prayer  for  this  change  of  heart,  with  groans  and  struggles, 
the  house  was  like  a  tomb.  The  poor  young  man  was  in 
his  chamber  alone,  and  his  groans  and  cries  wei'e  heard 
through  the  whole  house.  All  the  other  members  of  the 
family  staid  in  their  own  rooms  in  silence,  until  at  last,  by 
some  natural  reaction  of  feeling,  there  came  a  sense  of  rest 
and  peace  to  his  mind,  which  tho^  believed  to  be  the  new 
birth.  She  also  describes  the  way  in  which  Dr.  Payson,  of 
Portland,  tortured  his  little  daughter,  three  years  old,  by  a 
torture  as  well  meant,  as  conscientious,  and  more  terrible 
than  that  of  the  Holy  Inquisition.  He  told  his  little  daugh- 
ter that  she  hated  God  ;  that  she  must  have  a  change  of 
heart,  but  that  she  could  not  get  it  for  herself;  and  that 
even  her  prayers,  until  she  was  converted,  were  only  making 
her  worse.  The  poor  little  girl  denied  that  she  hated  God  ; 
she  said  she  was  sure  she  loved  him.  Then  the  misguided 
father  brought  up  all  her  little  childish  faults  as  a  proof  that 
she  hated  God ;  for  if  she  loved  him  she  would  never  do 
Avrong.  And  so,  from  three  years  of  age  till  she  was  thir- 
teen, this  poor,  infatuated  parent  tormented  this  little  child 
by  keeping  her  on  this  spiritual  rack  —  all  because  of  a  false 
view  of  the  passages  concerning  regeneration  in  the  Bible. 
And  when  we  think  of  the  twenty  thousand  pulpits  which 
to-day  are  teaching  in  this  counti-y  this  same  sort  of  belief, 
it  is  evident  that  it  is  our  duty  to  see  Avhat  the  Master  really 
meant  to  teach  us  by  this  passage. 

Nicodemus  is  the  type  of  a  class  of  men  common  in  all 
times.  We  have  seen  Nicodemus  very  often.  He  is  a 
good  man  whose  goodness  has  no  life  in  it.  His  goodness  is 
a  sort  of  an  automaton  —  all  machinery  and  no  soul.     He  is 


190    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

so  thoroughly  right  in  all  he  does  ;  everything  about  him  is  so 
proper  ;  he  is  so  perfectly  en  regie  in  his  own  eyes,  —  that  we 
sometimes  wish  that  he  might  be  betrayed  into  some  impro- 
priety, commit  some  not  too  great  folly,  have  some  escapade 
of  rash  enthusiasm.  You  respect  him  so  much,  you  wonder 
why  you  do  not  love  him  more.  It  is  because  he  is  not  open 
to  influence.  His  goodness  is  so  rigid,  his  opinions  so  declared, 
hii5  character  so  pronounced,  that  there  is  no  crack  anywhere 
by  which  God  or  man  can  reach  him.  He  has  a  whole  armor 
of  opinions  all  round  him,  and  you  cannot  get  through  it. 
He  has  narrowed  himself,  and  shut  himself  in,  so  that  he 
feels  no  influence  of  sympathy  coming  from  the  wide  ocean 
of  humanity  around,  no  influence  of  love  from  the  deep 
heaven  of  God  above.  He  is  a  sort  of  good  rhinoceros,  with 
a  skin  so  thick  that  nothing  can  pierce  it. 

Nicodemus  was  such  a  man,  and  he  came  to  Jesus  with 
all  his  opinions  cut  and  dried,  ready  for  an  argument.  He 
begins  in  a  very  formal  and  precise  Avay.  "  Rabbi,  we 
know  thou  art  a  teacher  come  from  God,  for  no  man  can  do 
these  miracles  that  thou  doest  except  God  be  with  him." 
He  observes  all  proprieties ;  he  calls  Jesus  Doctor,  — 
"  Rabbi,"  —  but  takes  good  care  not  to  call  him  Christ.  He 
gives  his  reason  for  thinking  Jesus  a  teacher  come  from  God, 
namely,  his  miracles.  Not  his  holiness,  not  his  inspiration, 
not  his  supreme  sweetness,  not  that  he  is  a  channel  through 
which  God's  tenderness  runs  down  into  our  hearts.  No ; 
he  sees  no  such  spiritual  proof  as  this,  but  a  merely  logical 
one,  expressed  almost  in  the  form  of  a  syllogism.  Major 
proposition  —  "  No  man  can  work  miracles  without  God's 
help."  Minor  proposition  —  "  Jesus  Avorks  miracles.''  Con- 
clusion—  "  Therefore  Jesus  has  God's  help." 

Now,  what  does  Jesus  reply  ?  Evidently  much  of  the  con- 
versation has  been  omitted.  We  have  only  the  substance  of 
it  here.  "  You  believe  in  the  kingdom  of  heaven,  Nicodemus." 
"  Certainly."    "  How  do  you  expect  to  know  it  when  you  see 


CONVERSION    AND    REGENERATION.  191 

it?  "  "  By  some  great  outward  signs  ;  something  which  shall 
shake  heaven  and  earth  ;  the  Messiah  coiniag  in  the  sky,  with 
angels."  "  Nicodemus,  you  cannot  even  see  the  kingdom 
when  it  is  here,  it'  you  look  lor  it  so  ;  you  must  be  born  again 
yourself;  you  must  be  changed,  and  become  as  a  little  child, 
in  order  to  enter  the  kingdom."  We  remember  that  Peter, 
■who  was  probably  not  half  as  good  as  Nicodemus,  an  impul- 
sive soul,  was  nevertheless  enough  of  a  little  child,  in  open- 
ness of  heart,  to  see  that  this  was  the  kingdom  of  heaven, 
—  lliis  teaching  and  life  of  Jesus,  —  and  that  Jesus  was  the 
Messiah. 

But  Nicodemus  says,  "  No.  A  Gentile,  a  heathen,  ought, 
no  doubt,  to  begin  at  the  beginning,  give  up  all  his  old  opin- 
ions, and  be  born  of  water  by  being  baptized.  He  should  be- 
gin by  a  recantation.  I  suppose  that  is  what  you  mean  by 
being  born  again.  But  /  ought  not,  for  I  am  a  Jew,  grown 
up  in  the  true  knowledge  of  God,  learned  from  Moses  and  the 
prophets.     So  I  need  not  begin  my  life  again." 

Jesus  then  replies,  "  The  form  is  nothing.  You  must  be 
born  not  only  of  water,  but  of  the  Spirit,  in  order  to  enter  the 
kingdom  of  God.  You  need  not  only  to  wash  oiF  all  your 
old  opinions  and  conduct,  as  the  Gentiles  must  do  ;  but  also 
you  must  be  made  a  little  child  by  laying  your  heart  open  to 
God's  Spirit,  and  letting  it  lead  your  thoughts  into -new  ways, 
your  heart  into  new  love,  and  your  life  into  new  action. 
You  must  be  willing  to  follow  me,  not  by  night  only,  but  in 
the  day.  If  they  turn  you  out  of  the  Sanhedrim,  you  must 
not  mind  that ;  you  must  find  your  happiness  in  getting  good 
and  doing  good ;  receiving  God's  love  into  your  soul,  and 
letting  it  go  out  again.  You  must  give  yourself  up  to  this 
divine  influence." 

Then  Nicodemus  says,  "■  How  can  these  things  be?  "  He 
wishes  to  sec  the  way,  to  have  it  all  marked  out ;  to  have  a 
creed  with  all  its  articles  of  belief  fixed ;  a  programme  of 
what  he  is  to  do  arranged.     The  spirit  he  does  not  quite 


192  ORTHODOXY  :    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

understand.  Give  it  to  him  in  the  letter,  and  he  can  do  it. 
He  wants'  a  map  of  the  operations  of  the  Holy  Spirit. 

"  Are  you  a  teacher  of  Israel,  and  do  not  know  this?"  re- 
plies Jesus.  "  The  whole  Old  Testament  is  full  of  this  in- 
spiration ;  full  of  the  Spirit  of  God  coming  and  going,  in  a 
thousand  ways,  and  not  by  any  special  rule  or  method ;  go- 
ing as  the  wind  comes  and  goes  in  the  sky,  we  do  not  know 
whence  or  how."  It  is  well  that  some  things  cannot  be  ar- 
ranged beforehand  —  well  that  no  almanac  can  tell  if  the 
wind  to-morrow  is  to  be  east  or  west,  north  or  south. 

I  sit  in  the  sweet  autumn  woods.  I  see  the  squirrel  leap 
from  branch  to  branch.  I  hear  the  woodpecker  tapping  the 
trunk  with  sagacious  beak,  watching  when  the  sound  shall  in- 
dicate that  a  worm  has  hidden  himself  below  the  bark.  All 
else  is  calm  and  still.  I  look  up  aud  see  the  white  clouds 
drifting  through  the  deep  ocean  of  blue  above.  Then  there 
comes  a  sudden  shiver  through  the  tree-tops,  a  sprinkling  of 
dry  leaves  on  the  grass,  a  whisper,  a  rush  of  air ;  and  now 
every  tree  is  swinging  its  branches  in  the  breeze. 

So  is  every  one  that  is  born  of  the  Spirit !  God  comes  to 
us  all  in  these  uncalculated,  incalculable  ways.  He  moves 
our  conscience  by  the  light  of  loyalty  and  fidelity  in  another 
soul.  There  comes  through  all  the  land  a  fresh  breeze  of 
justice  and  right,  and  all  at  once  we  feel  that  we  ought  to 
lead  better  lives,  more  manly,  more  true.  There  comes  a 
revival  of  honesty,  as  well  as  of  piety.  Yesterday  you  did 
not  care  for  it ;  now  you  do.  God's  holy  air  of  truth  and 
right  is  sweeping  through  the  land.  We  all  arise  aud  say, 
"  No  matter  what  our  fathers  consented  to  ;  no  matter  what 
we  have  consented  to  in  past  times ;  we  will  have  no  more 
compromises  with  evil  and  sin,  no  more  concessions  to  tyran- 
ny and  cruelty."  When  this  spirit  comes  to  a  nation,  or  to 
a  community,  it  is  as  much  a  revival  sent  by  God,  as  the 
reformation  of  Luther,  or  the  reformation  of  Wesley. 

Jesus  means  to  teach  us  here  that  the  Spirit  of  God  comes 


CONVERSION    AND   REGENERATION.  193 

in  a  grc.it  many  different  ways,  comes  unexpected  and  un- 
foreseen, comes  unapparent  as  the  invisible  air.  So  came 
the  reformation  of  Luther.  Luther  did  not  mean  to  make  a 
reformation,  or  to  build  a  new  Church.* 

All  recollect  the  story  of  the  Quaker,  George  Fox,  how  he 
went  from  Church  to  Church,  and  got  no  good,  and  at  last 
opened  his  soul  to  God,  and  was  led  by  the  Spirit  into  new  and 
strange  thoughts  and  purposes,  and  became  a  reformer,  and 
founder  of  a  denomination,  unintentionally.  And  so  the 
Quaker  movement  came  —  the  most  radical  reform  which  ever 
sprang  up  in  the  Christian  Church.  It  abolished  the  ministry 
and  sacraments,^)aptism,  and  the  Lord's  supper.  It  reformed 
the  theology  of  Christendom,  putting  the  inner  light  above  the 
written  words.  It  reformed  life,  opposing  war,  oaths,  slavery, 
and  fashion.  And  as  it  came,  so  is  it  passing  away,  having 
done  its  work.  As  the  breeze  dies  softly,  and  the  leaves 
cease  to  glitter  in  the  sunlight,  and  the  red  leaf  on  the  top- 
most twig,  far  up  in  the  sky,  leaves  off  its  airy  dance,  and 
at  last  hangs  motionless,  so  the  wild  air  which  stiri-ed  in  the 
depths  of  all  hearts  dies  away  in  silence,  and  old  opinions 
and  old  customs  resume  their  places,  yet  all  purified  and 
changed.  Only  those  which  were  so  wholly  dead  that  the 
wind  blew  them  entirely  away,  are  gone  forever. 

So  are  the  changes  which  come  in  human  hearts,  we  know 
not  whence  or  how.  It  is  a  great  mistake  in  the  Church  to 
have  a  stereotyped  experience,  to  which  all  must  conform. 
Procrustes  only  lopped  the  limbs  to  suit  the  measure  of  his 
bed  ;  but  these  rules  and  moulds  for  the  spiritual  life,  cut 
down  the  new  man,  who  is  made  by  God's  Spirit,  to  the  earth- 
ly standard  of  some  narrow  stunted  experience  of  other  times. 
This  it  is  "  to  grieve  the  Spirit,"  and  to  "  quench  the  Spirit." 

*  Luther,  in  his  "  Table-talk,"  says  of  his  preaching:  agrainst  the  pope,  and 
the  enormous  labors  it  entailed,  "  If  I  had  known  then  what  I  now  know  of 
the  difficulty  of  the  task,  ten  horses  should  not  have  drawn  me  to  it."  "  At 
that  time  Dr.  Jerome  withstood  me,  and  said,  '  What  will  you  do  .'  They  will 
not  endure  it.'    But  said  I,  '  What  if  they  must  endure  it.' ' " 

17 


194      ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

For  God's  Spirit  goes  everywhere,  and  where  it  goes  it  pro- 
duces the  best  evidence  of  Christianity  in  sweet,  holy, 
Christian  lives.  It  is  the  wind  which  blows  where  it  will, 
which  does  not  run  on  a  railroad  through  the  sky,  or  stop  at 
any  particular  stations  in  the  clouds,  or  go  by  any  time-table. 
God's  Spirit  comes  and  goes  not  according  to  any  rules  of 
ours.  The  publicans  and  sinners  have  it,  and  show  it,  some- 
times, instead  of  the  Scribes  and  Pharisees.  For  so  the 
apostle  declares  that  there  are  "  differences  of  operation,  but 
the  same  Spirit." 

Sometimes  you  see  a  hard  man,  a  man  of  the  world,  who 
has  been  fighting  his  way  through  life,  till  he  has  come  to 
rely  wholly  on  himself,  and  feels  like  some  of  those  rocky 
reefs  which  stand  out  in  the  sea  on  our  New  England  coast, 
and  have  borne  the  onset  of  a  thousand  storms.  Yet  at  last 
he  is  softened.  We  see  it,  we  feel  it.  There  is  a  strange 
softness  in  his  tone,  a  gentleness  in  his  manner,  a  suspicion 
of  moisture  in  his  eye.  The  good  God  has  been  moving  in 
his  heart ;  perhaps  it  was  by  some  trial  or  disappointment, 
or  the  loss  of  some  curly-headed  darling,  who  went  up  to 
heaven,  and  left  the  doors  open  behind,  so  that  the  joyful 
music  which  welcomed  her  came  down  to  his  ears  and  touched 
his  soul. 

When  men  see  that,  they  say,  "  Well,  there  is  something 
in  religion,  after  all,  if  it  can  touch  such  a  heart  as  his." 

Sometimes  we  see  a  Christian  who  is  at  first  all  conscience, 
all  work.  Religion  means  to  him,  doing  his  duty.  He  in- 
tends to  be  a  Christian,  and  wishes  others  to  be  so.  But  it 
is  a  piece  of  hard  work.  His  Christianity  reminds  one  of 
the  poor  woman  who  thought  it  "  a  chore  to  live."  But 
after  a  while,  we  see  a  change  —  very  gradual,  but  still  very 
certain.  He  is  beginning  to  get  acquainted  with  the  gospel 
side  of  Christianity.  He  learns  to  forgive  himself  his  own 
sins,  and  so  he  can  forgive  others.  His  face  begins  to  reflect 
more  and  more  of  heaven.     It  is  the  change  which  comes  to 


CONVERSION    AND    REGKNKRATION.  195 

tlie  grapes  in  October.  Perhaps  you  liave  some  Cr*awb? 
grapes  on  the  south  side  of  your  house,  aud  they  grow  ver; 
nicely  all  through  the  summer.  They  are  good,  large  grapes 
well  formed,  good  clusters,  but  very  sour.  But  by  and  b/ 
there  comes  the  final  change ;  the  juice  grows  sweet  withi/ 
the  berry.  There  is  but  a  very  little  difierence  in  its  appear 
ance,  but  a  very  great  change  xvithin. 

"When  we  see  this  alteration  in  a  man,  we  say,  "  There  is 
surely  something  in  Christianity  to  produce  such  a  change. 
Why,  what  a  very  sweet  Christian  he  has  grown  to  be  !  It 
took  all  the  summer  and  part  of  the  fall  to  do  the  work ; 
but  no  matter.  God  is  not  in  a  hurry.  Some  fruit  ripens 
sooner,  and  some  later  ;  that  is  all. 

I  looked  up  from  my  table  as  I  wrote  these  words,  and 
saw  from  my  window  a  tulip  tree  aud  a  maple,  each  dressed 
in  its  royal  robes  of  beauty  —  the  gift  of  the  declining  year  ; 
the  green  leaves  of  the  one  touched  with  gold,  and  the  other 
with  its  crimson  and  scarlet  glories.  They  were  full  of  sun- 
light, and  made  the  whole  landscape  glad  and  gay.  No 
Tyriau  loom  could  I'ival  the  purple  splendors  and  deep  crim- 
son of  these  trees.  Why  does  God  give  all  this  varied  beauty 
to  the  October  woods,  so  that  Solomon  in  all  his  glory  was 
not  arrayed  like  one  of  these  oaks  or  maples  ?  Is  not  this 
also  to  touch  our  hearts  with  a  sense  of  his  love  ?  An  au- 
tumn ride  is  also  a  means  of  grace  ;  quite  as  much  so,  per- 
haps, as  a  tract  or  sermon.  If  we  see  God  in  nature,  then 
nature  may  also  be  the  source  of  a  new  birth  to  us. 

"  One  impulse  from  the  autumn  wood 
May  teach  us  more  of  man, 
Of  moral  evil  and  of  good, 
Than  all  the  sages  can." 

What  I  understand  Jesus,  then,  to  teach  in  this  passage, 
is,  that  "we  must  become  as  little  children,  in  order  to  see 
heavenly  things  ;  that,  like  new-born  babes,  we  must  receive 
meekly  the  milk  of  the  word  of  God  ;  that  spiritual  influences 


196    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

are  all  around  us,  invisible  —  incalculable :  that  not  by  the 
regular  outWard  means  of  religion  alone,  but  by  a  thousand 
other  ways,  G-od  comes  to  us.  He  means  that  we  should 
believe  in  the  presence  and  nearness  of  God's  Spirit  always ; 
that  we  should  open  our  hearts  and  minds  to  be  led  by  it 
into  truth  and  love.  He  meant  the  very  opposite  of  what 
he  has  been  made  to  mean.  He  did  not  mean  that  all  souls 
must  pass  through  one  and  the  same  religious  experience, 
but  that,  as  the  wind  blows  a  thousand  ways,  so  God's  Spirit 
comes  to  the  heart  by  a  thousand  ways.  So  coming,  it 
makes  the  hard  heart  tender,  the  rude  will  gentle,  the  self- 
ish soul  generous,  gives  the  reckless  a  new  sense  of  respon- 
sibility. Jesus  means  that  we  should  not  be  discouraged 
because  we  find  it  hard  to  correct  our  faults,  or  to  enter  into 
God's  love.  God's  Spirit  comes  to  us  when  we  cannot  go  to 
find  it.  God's  love  comes  into  our  hearts  when  we  long  for 
it,  look  for  it,  wait  for  it. 

Look  up,  then,  poor  trembling  heart ;  look  up,  and  see 
God  near.  Look  up,  hard  heart,  and  feel  the  soft  showers 
of  divine  grace  coming  down  to  make  everything  tender. 
Look  up,  and  be  made  new  creatures,  become  as  little  chil- 
dren, be  born  anew,  every  day,  into  a  fresh  inspiration,  faith, 
and  hope  ;  and  so  enter  every  day  the  kingdom  of  heaven  ! 

§  12.  Evidences  of  Regeneration.  —  The  common  Ortho- 
dox method  is  to  require  and  expect  evidence  of  the  Christian 
change.  As  we  have  already  said,  a  Christian  is  expected 
to  know  and  to  be  able  to  tell  when,  where,  and  under  what 
circumstances  he  entered  into  the  new  life. 

But,  perhaps,  the  preliminary  question  is.  Ought  we  to  have, 
and  can  we  have,  any  evidence  at  all  of  the  new  life  ?  And 
to  this  question  many  reply  in  the  negative,  and  with  very 
good  reason. 

The  new  life  is  a  hidden  life  ;  a  "  life  hid  with  Christ  iu 
God."  Its  essence  is  love,  and  love  is  an  inward  sentiment, 
not  an  outward  act.     Conviction  demands  utterance  ;  actions 


CONVERSION    AND    REGKNERATION.  197 

speak  louder  than  words  ;  but  love  is  accustomed  to  hide  it- 
self away  iii  the  heart,  and  to  be  known  only  to  its  object, 
and  that  indirectly.  Evidences  of  love  !  What  should  we 
think  of  asking  of  young  people  coming  to  be  married,  the 
evidences  that  they  loved  eacli  other  ;  obliging  them  to  give  an, 
account  of  tlieir  experience  ;  to  say  when,  where,  and  how 
they  began  first  to  care  for  each  other ;  and  then,  if  the  evi- 
dence Avas  satisfactory,  allowing  them  to  be  married  !  Why, 
then,  ask  of  the  soul  wishing  to  be  united  with  God  and  Christ 
in  a  Christian  covenant,  to  tear  open  the  folded  bud  of  this 
tender  affection,  analyze  it  metaphysically,  measure  it  math- 
ematically, and  cross-examine  it  as  a  Avitness  suspected  of 
falsehood  is  questioned  by  lawyers  before  a  jury? 

What  do  we  know  of  this  new  life  ?  Avhat  can  we  tell  of  it? 
Almost  always  it  comes  to  us  gradually  and  unconsciously. 
It  is  veiled  in  shadows,  misty  lights,  and  neutral  tints.  The 
second  life  comes  like  the  first.  The  child  is  born,  and 
knows  not  of  the  awful  change  from  not  being  to  being  —  the 
immense  event  of  passage  from  unconscious  existence  to  con- 
scious life.  For  consciousness  dawns  slowly,  imperceptibly. 
The  infant  is  long  immersed  in  outward  things.  Years  pass 
before  it  becomes  aware  of  the  fact  that  it  exists,  before  it 
begins  to  look  in  and  see  itself  in  the  mirror  of  reflection. 
So,  probably,  will  it  also  be,  when  we  pass  from  this  life  into 
the  next.  We  shall,  perhaps,  awaken  very  gradually,  in  the 
future  life,  to  the  knowledge  that  we  are  in  another  state. 
As  the  little  child  becomes  quite  at  home  in  this  world  before 
he  thinks  to  ask  how  he  came  here,  so  probably  in  the  other 
world  we  shall  become  quite  at  home  with  the  angels,  before 
we  shall  begin  to  say,  "  I  am  in  heaven." 

All  the  births  of  time  partake  of  this  quality.     They  do 

not  reflect  on  themselves,  are  not  surprised  at  themselves, 

but  come  as  a  matter  of  course.     Years    after,  when    the 

early  heat  of  the  new  life  has  grown  cold,  the  historians  and 

17* 


198     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

biogniphers   arrive  to  examine  it  in    the    crucible  of  their 
painful  analysis,  and  to  tell  us  how  wonderful  it  is. 

How  can  any  man  prove  that  he  is  alive  ?  Why  should  he 
prove  it  ?  Let  his  life  show  itself,  but  not  try  to  prove  it- 
self. Let  its  light  shine,  and  those  who  see  its  good  and  jo} 
will  glorify  the  Father  in  heaven  who  has  sent  it. 

The  mistake  here,  as  before,  is  in  confounding  conversion 
and  regeneration. 

Including  in  the  terms  "  conversion  "  and  "  repentance  " 
the  whole  activity  of  the  Avill,  the  religious  purpose,  the  aim 
of  life,  it  is,  no  doubt,  of  the  utmost  importance  to  see,  con- 
tinually, what  it  is.  "  Know  thyself"  is  a  heaven-descended 
maxim,  if  we  understand  by  it  that  we  are  to  watch  ourselves 
always,  and  see  whither  we  are  going.  We  need  continually 
to  know  the  direction  of  our  life,  whether  it  is  to  God  or  from 
him ;  whether  it  is  upward  or  downward ;  Avhether  we  are 
following  truth,  and  justice,  and  love,  or  following  our  own 
selfish  desires  and  will.  In  this  sense  self-examination  is 
both  possible  and  necessary. 

When  the  great  ocean  steamer  is  in  the  midst  of  the  mighty 
Atlantic,  it  is  necessary  to  watch  continually  its  direction, 
and  keep  it  always  heading  the  right  way.  Day  and  night, 
therefore,  the  man  stands  sleepless  at  the  helm,  his  eye  al- 
ways turning  from  the  compass  to  the  ship's  head,  with  un- 
failing vigilance.  But  it  is  not  thought  necessary  to  inspect 
the  interior  of  the  boilers,  or  to  examine  the  quality  of  the 
fire.  If  steam  enough  is  made,  and  the  wheels  revolve,  that 
is  enough. 

The  new  life  into  which  we  enter  by  the  new  birth  has 
this  one  character  —  that  it  gives  us  for  a  motive,  not  fear,  but 
hope  ;  not  law,  but  love  ;  not  constraint,  but  joy.  Prayer  is 
not  a  duty,  but  the  spontaneous  impulse  of  the  child,  to  seek  and 
find  its  father.  Work  is  not  drudgery  but  satisfaction,  when 
the  motive  is  to  serve  the  great  cause  of  Christ.  The  only 
real  evidence,  therefore,  that  we  are  born  of  God,  is,  that  we 


CONVEIISION    AND    IlliGENEKATION.  199 

have  the  fruits  of  tl:c  Spirit,  love,  joy,  and  peace.  The  tree 
is  known  by  its  fruits,  and  these  are  the  approjiriate  fruits  of 
the  new  life.  Wheu  we  find  them,  let  us  gladly  receive 
them  ;  but  if  we  do  not  find  them,  let  us  at  least  be  glad  that 
if  not  yet  new-born,  wo,  ai-e,  nevertheless,  converted  ;  if  not 
sons,  at  least  servants.  We  have  the  one  thing  needful  Avhen 
we  have  the  right  purpose  ;  sooner  or  later,  we  shall  also 
have  the  happy  life.  When  we  do  right,  we  sow  to  the  Spirit, 
and  we  shall,  in  due  season,  reap  life  everlasting. 

As  regards  the  evidence  of  the  new  life,  too  much  stress, 
we  think,  has  been  laid  on  outward  profession,  ceremonies, 
religious  language,  religious  acts.  Because  a  man  professes 
religion,  it  is  no  evidence  that  he  is  religious.  Because  he 
partakes  of  the  Lord's  supper,  or  prays  openly,  or  speaks  in 
the  habitual  religious  language  of  his  sect,  it  is  no  evidence 
of  his  religious  life.  Many  persons  are  quite  comforted  if 
one  who  has  led  an  immoral  life  says  on  his  death-bed  that 
he  "  trusts  in  the  atoning  blood  of  Christ."  But  this  may 
be  a  mere  word. 

All  ceremonies  and  prayers  are  means,  but  none  of  them 
are  evidence,  of  a  state.  The  only  evidences  are  the  fruits 
of  the  Spirit.  "•  The  tree  is  known  by  its  fruits."  "  The 
fruits  of  the  Spirit  are  love,  joy,  peace,  long-suffering,  gen- 
tleness, goodness,  faith,  meekness,  temperance."  ' 

Let  us  remember  that  though  a  man  may  be  converted, 
and  not  as  yet  be  regenerate,  he  cannot  be  regenerate  un- 
less he  is  converted ;  that  is,  there  can  be  no  true  piety,  no 
love,  no  faith,  no  spiritual  religion,  except  there  be  a  sincere 
and  determined  purpose  of  righteousness  beneath  it.  There 
may  be  true  morality  without  piety,  but  there  cannot  be  a 
true  piety  without  a  true  morality.  The  law  must  precede  the 
gospel.  Conscientiousness  must  go  befoi-e  love,  to  prepare 
its  way.  "  That  is  not  first  which  is  spiritual,  but  that 
which  is  natural,  and  aftenuards  that  which  is  spiritual." 

lHhQ first  question,  therefore,  to  ask  ourselves,  is  not,  "Do 


200  ORTHODOXY  :    ITS   TRUTHS   AND    ERRORS. 

I  love  God?"  but,  "Do  I  obey  God?"  Every  man's  own 
soul,  if  sincere,  can  answer  that  question.  '•  If  our  heart 
condemn  us,  Grod  is  greater  than  our  heart."  "  If  our 
heart  condemn  us  not,  then  have  we  confidence  towards 
God." 

But  if  we  are  obeying  God,  then  let  us  believe  in  a  higher 
life  which  God  has  to  bestow,  and  believing,  seek  for  it.  It 
is  not  earned,  it  is  not  a  reward,  it  is  not  by  works  ;  but  it 
is  very  nigh  and  close  at  hand  ;  it  is  ready  to  be  given  to 
those  who  believe  in  it  and  look  for  it. 

So,  if  the  question  be  asked,  "•  Is  man  active  or  passive  in 
this  process  ?  "  the  answer  is,  that  he  is  active  in  conversion, 
receptive  in  regeneration. 

So  in  regard  to  faith  and  works.  "  We  are  justified  by 
faith  ;"  but  justification  is  the  sense  of  God's  forgiving  love 
which  is  received  into  an  open  heart.  Justification  is  not 
salvation  ;  it  is  only  a  step  in  that  direction,  and  a  prepara- 
tion for  it. 

And  now  we  ask,  "  Why  is  it,  if  this  new  life  is  a  gift,  do 
not  all  good  men  receive  it?"  The  answer  is,  "There  are 
conditions.  All  good  men  do  not  believe  in  it.  Some  be- 
lieve that  duty  is  every  thing ;  that  Christianity  consists 
wjiolly  in  obedience.  They  know  nothing  higher,  and  there- 
fore seek  for  nothing  higher.  Regeneration  they  hear  of, 
but  think  it  something  mystical,  miraculous,  unnatural,  and, 
to  say  the  truth,  not  very  attractive.  If  they  believed  in  a 
life  of  love  and  trust,  a  life  free  from  the  burden  of  anxiety, 
they  would  surely  desire  it." 

Those  also  Avho  believe  in  it  do  not  always  believe  it  is 
for  themselves.  They  think  it  not  meant  for  common  peo- 
ple in  the  midst  of  common  life,  but  for  some  special  saint- 
ship.  They  do  not  believe  in  this  divine  life  flowing  into 
every  heart  and  soul,  high  and  low,  wise  and  ignorant,  be  it 
only  sincere,  honest,  and  believing. 

Yet  it  is  like  the  life  of  nature,  which  in  the  abounding 


CONVERSION    AND    REGENERATION.  201 

spring-lime  comes  down  from  the  skies,  and  flows  not  only 
into  the  majestic  tree,  swelling  at  once  its  myriad  buds,  but 
also  into  every  seed,  and  root,  and  weed,  awakening  them 
all. 

This  is  what  we  need  for  peace,  for  real  progress,  for 
present  comfort,  for  future  joy. 

It  is  communion  with  God,  it  is  receiving  his  love,  it  is 
accepting  his  forgiveness,  and  living  day  by  day  as  his  be- 
loved children. 


202         orthodoxy:  its  truths  SlND  errors. 


CHAPTER    VIII. 

THE  ORTHODOX  IDEA  OF  THE  SON  OF  GOD. 

§  1.  Orthodox  Doctrine  stated.  —  Having  considered  the 
Orthodox  idea  of  man  in  his  natural  state,  and  of  man  in  his 
supernatural  state,  we  next  pass  to  consider  the  Orthodox 
idea  of  Christ's  person  and  of  Christ's  work.  In  this  chap- 
ter we  shall  consider  the  Orthodox  view  of  the  person  of 
Christ,  and  ask  what  is  its  substantial  truth,  and  what  its 
formal  error. 

The  Orthodox  opinion  concerning  Christ  is  thus  stated  in 
the  Assembly's  Confession  of  Faith :  "  The  Son  of  God,  the 
second  person  in  the  Trinity,  being  very  and  eternal  God, 
of  one  substance  and  equal  with  the  Father,  did,  when  the 
fulness  of  time  was  come,  take  upon  him  man's  nature,  with 
all  the  essential  properties  and  common  infirmities  thereof, 
yet  without  sin  ;  so  that  two  whole,  perfect,  and  distinct  na- 
tures —  the  Godhead  and  the  Manhood  —  were  inseparably 
joined  together  in  one  person,  which  person  is  very  God  and 
very  Man." 

Christ,  therefore,  was  perfectly  God  and  perfectly  man. 
The  formula  is,  "  two  natures^  hut  one  person"  The  Ortho- 
dox doctrine  is  not  of  God  dwelling  in  a  human  body  as  its 
soul  (which  seems  to  be  the  view  of  Swedenborg),  but  it  is 
of  God  united  with  a  human  soul  and  body  as  one  person  or 
one  consciousness. 

§  2.  This  Doctrine  gradually  developed.  —  This  idea  of 
Christ,  as  we  know,  was  gradually  formed  in  the  Christian 
Church,  and  did  not  become  Orthodox  until  after  many  strug- 
gles.    First  came  the  question  whether  the  Deity  of  Christ 


ORTHODOX  IDEA  OF  THE  SON  OF  GOD.      203 

was  equal  or  subordinate  to  that  of  the  Father.  Hardly 
had  the  Orthodox  doctrine  triumphed  over  that  of  subordina- 
tion, against  those  who  denied  the  equal  Deity,  than  it  was 
obliged  to  turn  round  and  contend  against  those  on  the  other 
side,  who  denied  the  humanity  of  Christ  altogether.  The 
Ebionitcs  considered  Jesus  as  a  mere  man.  Theodotus,  in 
the  year  200,  taught  the  same,  with  Artemon  and  Praxeas. 
In  the  next  century  the  Ariaus  and  Sabellians  opposed  Or- 
thodoxy from  opposite  sides,  —  the  one  conibundiug  the  per- 
sons of  the  Godhead,  and  the  other  dividing  the  substance. 
So  for  several  centuries  the  pendulum  of  opinion  swung  from 
one  side  to  the  other  before  it  rested  in  the  golden  mean  of 
Orthodoxy. 

The  Nestorians  separated  the  two  natures  of  Christ,  and 
maintained  that  his  Divinity  consisted  only  in  the  indwelling 
of  God.  But  scarcely  had  Nestorius  been  banished  for 
separating  the  two  natures  than  Eutyches  plunged  into  heresy 
on  the  other  side,  by  confounding  them  together.  This  was 
the  Monophysite  heresy  ;  and  no  sooner  was  this  overthrown, 
and  it  was  decided  to  be  Avrong  to  say  that  Christ  had  only 
one  nature,  than  others  began  to  contend  that  he  had  only 
one  will.  These  were  the  Monothelites.  But  through  all 
these  controversies,  the  main  doctrine  of  Orthodoxy  con- 
tinues to  shine  out  luminous  and  distinct,  asserting  that 
Chi-ist  combines  the  fulness  of  Deity  and  the  fulness  of  Hu- 
manity. 

§  3.  Unitarian  Objections.  —  As  this  view  of  the  Deity 
of  Christ  has  been  stated,  it  seems,  in  its  doctrinal  form, 
contradictory  to  Scripture  as  well  as  to  reason.  That  the 
infinite  God,  who  fills  the  universe,  and  sustains  it ;  present 
in  the  smallest  insect ;  present  in  the  most  distant  nebula, 
whose  light  just  arriving  at  our  eye  has  been  a  million  of 
years  on  its  journey,  —  that  this  infinite  Being  should  have 
been  born  in  Palestine,  seems  to  confute  itself  by  its  very 
statement.     Who  took  care  of  the  universe  when  God  was 


204         orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

an  infant  in  the  arms  of  the  Virgin  Mary  ?  Jesus  was  bom, 
and  died;  but  God  cannot  be  born,  and  cannot  die.  Jesus 
suffered  from  hunger,  fatigue,  and  pain ;  but  God  cannot 
suffer.  Jesus  was  seen  by  human  eyes,  and  touched  by 
human  hands ;  but  no  man  hath  seen  God  at  any  time. 
Jesus  liad  a  finite  body  ;  but  God  is  Spirit.  Jesus  was' 
tempted ;  but  God  cannot  be  tempted  with  evil.  Jesus 
pi'ayed ;  but  God  cannot  pray.  Jesus  said,  "  My  Father  is 
greater  than  I ;  "  but  God  has  no  one  greater  than  himself. 
Jesus  said,  "  I  can  of  mine  own  self  do  nothing  ;  "  but  God 
can  of  his  own  self  do  everything.  Jesus  said  "  that  he 
came  down  from  heaven  not  to  do  his  own  will ;  "  but  God 
always  does  his  o^vn  will.  Jesus  said  that  there  were  some 
things  he  did  not  know ;  but  God  knows  everything.  He 
declared  that  all  power  was  given  to  him  in  heaven  and 
earth  ;  but  God's  power  cannot  be  given  to  him.  Scripture, 
therefore,  as  well  as  common  sense,  seems  to  deny  the  Or- 
thodox doctrine  of  the  Deity  of  Christ. 

The  common  Trinitarian  answer  to  these  texts  is,  that 
Christ  is  speaking  in  his  human  nature  when  he  asserts 
these  limitations.  But  this  answer,  as  Dr.  Bushnell  has 
well  shown,  is  no  answer  ;  for,  as  he  says,  "  it  not  only  does 
an  affront  to  the  plain  language  of  Scripture,  but  virtually 
denies  any  real  unity  between  the  human  and  the  divine." 
jTesus  does  not  say,  "All  power  in  heaven  and  earth  is  given 
to  my  human  nature"  but  "to  me;"  and  when  the  Trini- 
tarian himself  declares  that  in  Christ,  with  two  natures,  there- 
is  but  07%e  person,  the  question  is  concerning  that  one  person, 
whether  that  is  finite  or  infinite,  absolute  or  dependent,  om- 
niscient or  not  so,  omnipresent  or  not  so,  omnipotent  or  not  so. 
The  question  does  not  concern  his  nature,  but  himself.  The 
one  person  must  be  either  finite  or  infinite  :  it  cannot  be  both. 

§  4.  Substantial  Truth  in  this  Doctrine.  —  But  now  we 
ask,  What  substantial  truth  underlies  this  formal  error? 
"What  truth  of  life  underlies  this  error  of  doctrine? 


ORTHODOX  IDEA  OF  THE  SON  OF  GOD.      205 

Lei  lis  remember  how  empty  the  world  was  of  God  at  the 
time  of  Christ's  coming.  The  wisest  men  couUl  speak  thus 
with  Pliny :  "  All  religion  is  the  offspring  of  necessity, 
weakness,  and  fear.  What  God  is,  —  if  in  truth  he  be  any- 
thing distinct  from  the  world,  —  it  is  beyond  the  power  of 
man's  understanding  to  know."  All  intelligent  men  agreed 
that  if  God  existed  he  could  not  possibly  take  any  interest  in 
the  affairs  of  the  world  or  of  individuals.  Phariseeism  on 
the  one  hand,  and  Sadduceeism  on  the  other,  —  a  religion 
hardened  into  forms,  and  an  empty  scepticism,  cold  and 
dead,  —  divided  the  world  between  them.  But  men  cannot 
live  without  God,  and  be  satisfied.  They  were  feeling  after 
him,  if  haply  they  might  find  him,  who  is  not  far  from  any 
one  of  us. 

Then  Christ  came  ;  and  in  all  that  he  said  and  did,  he 
spoke  from  the  knowledge  of  God  ;  he  acted  from  the  life  of 
God.  Here  was  one,  then,  at  last,  to  whom  God  was  not 
an  opinion,  but  a  reality  ;  through  whose  life  flowed  the  life 
of  God  in  a  steady  current.  We  see  that  all  sincere  souls 
who  came  near  Jesus  received  from  him  the  same  sight  of 
God  which  he  possessed ;  for  faith  in  a  living  and  present 
God  is  so  congenial  to  the  nature  of  man,  that  it  carries  con- 
viction with  it  wherever  it  is  not  a  mere  opinion,  but  a  state 
of  the  soul. 

Those,  therefore,  who  could  find  God  nowhere  else,  found 
him  in  Christ.  Those  who  saw  him,  saw  the  Father.  As 
when  through  a  window  we  behold  the  heavens,  as  when  in 
a  mirror  we  see  an  image  of  the  sun,  we  do  not  speak  of 
the  window  or  the  mirror,  but  say  that  we  see  the  sun  and 
the  heavens,  so  those  who  looked  at  Christ  said  that  they 
saw  God. 

The  apostle  said  that  God  was  in  Christ ;   and  this  was 

wholly  true.     Christians  afterwards   said  that  Christ  was 

God ;    and   they  thought  they  were  only  saying  the  same 

thing.     They  said  that  Christ  had  a  divine  nature  us  well  as 

18 


20b  oethodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

a  human  nature ;  and  in  this  also  there  was  no  essential 
falsehood,  for  when  we  speak  of  our  nature,  we  intend 
merely  by  it  those  elements  of  character  Avhich  are  original 
and  permanent,  Avhich  are  not  acquired,  do  not  alter,  and 
are  never  lost.  God  dwelt  in  the  soul  of  Christ  thus  con- 
stantly, thus  permanently.  The  Word  thus  "  became  flesh, 
and  dwelt  among  us."  The  word  of  the  Lord  came  to  the 
prophets,  but  it  diuelt  in  Christ.  He  and  his  Father  were 
one.  The  vital  truth  of  all  this  was  that  men  were  now 
able  to  see  God  manifested  in  man  as  a  living,  present  re- 
ality. "  Here"  they  said,  "  is  God.  We  have  found  God. 
He  is  in  Christ.     We  can  see  him  there." 

Is  it  any  wonder  that  men  should  have  called  Jesus  God? 
that  they  should  call  him  so  still?  In  him  truly  "  dwelt  the 
fulness  of  the  Godhead  bodily  ;  "  and  this  indwelling  Spirit 
expressed  itself  in  what  he  said  and  what  he  did.  When 
Jesus  speaks,  it  is  as  if  God  speaks.  When  Jesus  does  any- 
thing, it  is  as  if  we  saw  God  do  it.  It  becomes  to  us  an 
expression  of  the  divine  character.  When  Jesus  says  to  the 
sinner,  "  Go  and  sin  no  more,"  we  see  in  this  a  manifesta- 
tion not  merely  of  his  own  compassion,  but  of  God's  forgiv- 
ing love ;  and  when  he  dies,  although  God  caunot  die,  yet 
he  dies  according  to  the  divine  will,  and  thus  expresses 
God's  willingness  to  suffer  for  the  redemption  of  the  world. 

§  5.  Formal  Error  of  the  Orthodox  Statement.  —  When 
we  look  at  Christ's  Divinity  from  this  point  of  view,  the  dis- 
tinction between  the  Trinitarian  and  Unitarian  seems  almost 
to  disappear.  Still  the  question  remains.  Is  it  right  to  call 
him  God?  The  distinction  remains  between  saying,  "God 
■was  in  Christ,"  and  saying,  "  Christ  was  God."  In  short, 
was  the  person  of  Christ  human  or  divine  ?  We  agree  with 
the  Orthodox  in  saying  that  Christ  had  two  natures  —  a 
divine  nature  and  a  human  nature.  We  also  maintain  with 
them  that  he  had  one  person.  But  the  question  comes.  Was 
that  one  person  divine  or  liuman,  finite  or  infinite,  dependent 


ORTHODOX  IDEA  OF  THE  SON  OF  GOD.      207 

or  absolute  ?  The  consciousness  of  the  one  person  is  a  sin- 
gle consciousness.  Christ  could  not  at  the  same  time  have 
been  conscious  of  knowing  all  things  and  of  not  knowing  all 
things,  of  having  all  power  and  of  not  having  it,  of  depend- 
ing on  God  for  all  things  and  of  not  depending  for  anything. 
One  of  two  things  alone  is  possible.  Either  Christ  was  God 
united  with  a  human  soul,  or  he  was  a  human  soul  united 
Avith  God.  When  Christ  uses  the  personal  pronoua  "I,"  he 
must  mean  by  that  "/"  either  the  finite  man  or  the  infinite 
God.  1  believe  the  Unitarian  is  right  in  saying  that  this 
personal  pronoun  "I"  always  refers  to  the  finite  being  and 
consciousness,  and  not  to  the  infinite  Being.  For  example  : 
"7  am  not  alone,  but  I  and  the  Father  that  sent  me."  "/ 
proceeded  forth  and  came  from  God ;  neither  came  I  of  my- 
self, hut  he  sent  me."  God  cannot  proceed  from  God  ;  God 
cannot  send  God.  Again  :  "  If  I  honor  myself,  my  honor  is 
nothing ;  it  is  my  Father  that  houoreth  me."  This  cannot 
mean,  "  If  God  honors  God,  his  honor  is  nothing ;  but  it  is 
God  that  honors  him."  It  must  mean  that  the  human  being, 
Christ,  receives  his  honor  from  the  divine  Being.  This  view 
—  that  the  person  of  Christ  is  human,  but  is  intimately 
united  and  in  perfect  union  with  the  indwelling  God  — 
makes  all  Scripture  intelligible.  Any  other  view  is  either 
unintelligible  or  contradictory.  This  view  of  the  divine 
nature  of  Christ  united  with  the  human  person,  of  God 
dwelling  in  the  flesh,  does  not  confound  the  mind  like  the 
common  Trinitarian  view,  and  yet  has  a  value  for  the  heart 
of  paramount  importance.  If  Christ  is  really  a  man  like 
ourselves,  made  in  all  respects  like  his  brethi-en,  and  yet  is 
thus  at  one  with  God,  thus  full  of  God,  it  shows  us  that  sin 
and  separation  from  God  are  accidental  things,  and  not 
anything  necessary.  If  Jesus  is  truly  a  man,  he  redeems 
and  exalts  humanity.  What  he  has  been  is  a  type  of  what 
all  men  may  be.  Thus  the  apostle  Paul  speaks  when  he 
says  that  all  things  were  created  in  Christ,  who  is  the  be- 


208    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

ginniug,  the  first-born  from  the  dead,  that  he  might  go  before 
us,  or  be  our  leader  in  all  things  ;  which  is  a  much  higher 
view  than  the  common  understanding  of  the  passage,  which 
merely  supposes  him  to  have  been  God's  instrument  in 
creating  the  physical  universe.  He  is  the  image  of  the 
invisible  God — the  first-born  of  the  whole  creation.  This 
creation  is  the  new  creation  —  that  which  is  intended  in 
Revelation  (3  :  14),  where  Christ  is  spoken  of  as  the  Amen, 
the  faithful  and  true  Witness,  the  Beginning  of  the  creation 
of  God,  and  that  which  Paul  means  when  he  says  that  in 
Christ  Jesus  neither  circumcision  nor  uncircumcision  is 
worth  anything,  "  but  the  new  creation." 

All  such  passages  refer,  as  it  seems  to  us,  not  to  a  past 
natural  creation,  but  to  a  supernatural  creation  —  a  creation 
of  life  eternal,  which,  beginning  in  Christ,  is  to  embrace  the 
whole  of  humanity. 

§  6.  Errors  of  Arianism  and  Naturalism.  —  And  We  can- 
not but  think  this  doctrine  far  truer,  as  well  as  more  Ortho- 
dox, than  the  Arianism  which  so  long  struggled  in  the  Church 
for  supremacy.  That  view  which  supposed  that  Christ  was 
neither  truly  man  nor  truly  God,  but  some  high,  preexisting 
being  between  the  two,  appears  to  us  to  be  the  falsest  and  most 
"  unsatisfactory  of  all  the  doctrines  couceruing  Clirist's  person. 
It  separates  him  more  entirely  from  our  sympathies  than 
either  of  the  others.  It  destroys  both  his  divinity  and  his 
humanity,  and,  by  giving  us  something  intermediate,  gives 
us  really  nothing.  It  makes  his  apparent  human  life  a  delu- 
sion, his  temptation  unreal,  his  human  sympathies  and  sor- 
rows deceptive.  We  think,  therefore,  that  the  Church  was 
right  in  rejecting  the  Arian  doctrine. 

We  think  it  was  also  right  in  rejecting  the  Humanitarian 
doctrine,  or  that  of  mere  Naturalism.  Christ  was  something 
more  than  mere  man,  —  something  more  than  Moses  and 
Elijah,  —  something  more  than  a  man  of  great  religious 
genius.     The  peculiarity  of  Christ  was,  that  he  was  chosen 

4 


•  IDEA    OP   THE    SON    OF   COD.  209 

by  God's  wisdom,  and  prepared  by  God's  j)rovideiice,  to  be 
the  typical  man  of  the  race,  —  (he  God-man,  in  whom  the 
divine  Spirit  and  hnman  soul  become  one  in  a  perfect  union. 
He  was,  perhaps,  placed,  by  an  exceptional  birth,  where  the 
first  Adam  stood,  —  rescued  from  inherited  depravity,  made 
in  the  image  of  God.  Then  the  Spirit  was  given  him  with- 
out measure.  The  word  of  God  divelt  in  him,  and  did  not 
merely  come  to  him  as  a  transient  influence  for  a  special  pur- 
pose. Add  to  this  a  freely  chosen  aim  of  life,  and  a  fidelity 
•which  Avas  always  about  his  Father's  business,  and  aiming  to 
finish  the  work  which  was  given  him  to  do,  and  we  have  a 
being  in  whom  we  can  see  either  a  manifestation  of  God  or 
a  manifestation  of  man.  The  Spirit  in  Christ  was  one  with 
God ;  the  soul  and  body  were  human. 
18* 


210         okthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 


CHAPTER    IX. 

JUSTIFICATION   BY  FAITH. 

§  1.  Tim  Doctrine  of  Paul  not  obsolete. — That  portiou 
of  the  New  Testament  which  speaks  so  earnestly  of  justifica- 
tion by  faith  is  by  many  supposed  to  have  become  obsolete  for 
all  useful  purposes  at  the  present  time.  The  doctrine  that 
"  we  are  justified  by  faith,  and  not  by  works,"  it  is  supposed, 
was  intended  for  the  benefit  of  the  Jews  alone,  and  to  amount 
to  this  —  that  admittance  to  the  privileges  of  the  gospel  is  to 
6e  obtained,  not  by  practising  the  ceremonies  and  external 
ritual  of  the  Jewish  law,  but  by  a  simple  belief  in  Jesus 
Christ.  Accordingly,  as  no  one  nowadays  endeavors  to 
become  a  Christian  by  practising  the  Jewish  ceremonies, 
we  suppose  that  there  is  no  present  need  of  this  doctrine  ; 
and  when  we  come  upon  it  in  the  Scripture,  we  turn  over 
the  pages  in  search  of  something  more  practical  and  profit- 
able. As,  in  the  book  of  Acts,  we  read,  that,  "  when  Paul 
was  about  to  open  his  mouth,  Gallio  said  unto  the  Jews,  If 
it  were  a  matter  of  wrong  or  wicked  lewdness,  O  Jews,  rea- 
son would  that  I  should  bear  with  you  ;  but  if  it  be  a  ques- 
tion of  words  and  names,  and  of  your  law,  look  ye  to  it ;  for 
I  will  be  no  judge  of  such  matters,"  so  we,  when  Paul  is 
about  to  open  his  mouth  to  speak  to  us  of  this  doctrine,  think 
it  a  mere  question  of  words  and  names,  and  of  the  Jewish 
law,  and  interrupt  him  to  ask  him  for  something  practical. 
If  be  has  anything  to  say  to  us  of  wrong-doing  or  wicked 
conduct,  it  would  be  reasonable  to  hear  him ;  but  we  will  be 
no  judge  of  such  matters  as  this. 

There  are  also  many  persons,  who,  while  they  can  under- 


JUSTIFICATION    BY    FAITH.  211 

stand  the  Gospels  and  eujoy  them,  llud  it  diHicuU  to  under- 
stand and  enjoy  the  writings  of  the  apostle  Paul.  Among 
these  writings,  the  most  dilHcult  is  the  I^lpistle  to  the  Romans, 
and  especially  that  part  of  it  which  treats  of  this  doctrine  of 
justification  by  faith.  Anything  which  can  be  done  to  re- 
move this  difficulty  will  do  good ;  for  the  writings  of  Paul 
are  so  intimately  connected  with  the  rest  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment, that  it  is  not  easy  to  reject  them,  and  yet  to  believe 
the  rest.  It  can  be  done,  no  doubt ;  but  it  is  done  with  dif- 
ficulty. It  is  as  if  one  part  of  the  foundation  of  the  house 
had  given  way :  perhaps  the  house  will  not  fall ;  but  it  has 
become  unsafe.  It  is  as  if  a  part  of  the  wall  of  a  city  had 
been  battered  down  :  the  breach  may  be  defeasible  from 
within ;  but  it  is  also  practicable  from  without.  At  all 
events,  we  miss  the  satisfaction  of  a  complete  faith,  perfect 
and  entire,  round  and  full. 

Besides,  may  there  not  be  something  important  for  us  to 
know  in  this  part  of  the  New  Testament?  Are  we  quite 
sure  we  do  not  need  these  very  doctrines,  and  that  they  will 
do  us  good? 

We  have  said  that  it  is  sometimes  thought  that  the  ques- 
tions discussed  by  Paul  were  only  Jewish  questions,  —  not 
human  questions  ;  that  they  belonged  only  to  that  time,  not 
to  all  time.  But,  though  the  form  which  they  assumed  was 
temporary  and  local,  there  is  reason  to  believe  that  the 
substance  of  the  question  is  one  belonging  to  human  nature 
in  every  age  ;  that  it  is  the  question  of  the  spirit  and  the  let- 
ter, the  substance  and  the  form,  the  root  and  the  bi'anches, 
the  inside  of  religion  and  the  outside.  While  contending 
against  a  particular  Jewish  error,  the  apostle  unfolded  prin- 
ciples by  Avhich  similar  errors  may  be  opposed  and  refuted 
in  every  age. 

At  all  events,  it  is  a  matter  of  fact,  that  there  seldom  has 
been  in  the  Church  any  great  religious  movement  which  has 
not  immediately  gone  back  to  the  apostle  Paul,  and  planted 


212     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

itself  on  his  doctrine  of  justification  by  faith.  Tiiis  was  the 
watch  Word  of  Luther,  and  the  soul  of  the  reformation.  Lu^ 
ther  and  his  companions  armed  themselves  with  this  doctrine 
to  contend  against  the  great  power  of  the  Papacy  and  the 
Eomish  Church. 

Let  us,  then,  endeavor  to  see  Avhat  we  can  of  the  truth 
there  may  be  in  this  doctrine. 

§  2.  Its  Meaning  and  Importance.  —  And,  first,  let  us  see 
what  the  doctrine  does  not  mean,  and  what  it  does  mean. 

To  be  justified  by  faith  does  not  mean  that  we  are  to  be 
saved  by  our  opinions.  To  say  that  a  man  can  be  saved  by 
holding  cei'tain  opinions,  instead  of  certain  other  opinions,  is 
to  say  what  is  contradicted  by  all  experience  ;  for  experience 
shows  us  that  there  are  good  inen  holding  every  variety  of 
opinion,  and  bad  men  holding  every  variety  of  opinion.  But 
God  saves  men  by  making  them  good :  therefore  men  are 
not  saved  by  their  opinions.  Let  us  suppose  that  men  are 
to  be  saved  by  the  opinion  that  Jesus  is  the  Christ :  then  we 
otfght  to  find  that  all  men  holding  that  opinion  are  on  the 
way  of  salvation  ;  that  is,  are  becoming  good  men.  But  this 
is  far  from  being  the  case.  In  fact,  the  connection  between 
mere  opinion  of  any  kind,  and  goodness,  is  very  distant  and 
indirect.  No  doubt,  in  the  long  run,  opinion  affects  chai'ac- 
ter ;  but  it  is  only  in  the  long  run  that  it  does  so.  And,  at 
all  events,  the  doctrine  of  the  New  Testament  is  very  distinct 
and  decided,  that  men  may  hold  very  sound  opinions,  and 
yet  not  be  in  the  way  of  salvation.  The  Scribes  and  Phari- 
sees held  very  sound  opinions ;  and  Jesus  told  his  disciples 
to  do  whatever  they  said,  but  not  to  imitate  their  works ;  for 
their  doctrine  was  much  better  than  their  lives. 

Nor  does  the  apostle  naean  to  say  that  one  can  be  saved 
without  morality.  He  certainly  does  not  mean  to  undervalue 
goodness ;  for,  in  that  case,  he  would  contradict  his  own 
teachings,  which  uniformly  declare,  as  all  the  rest  of  the 
Bible  declares,  that  without  holiness  no  man  can  see  the 


JUSTIFICATION    BY    FAITH.  213 

Lord.  It  is  certainly  a  very  superficial  view  which  is  satisfied 
with  supposing  that  an  earnest  man,  as  the  apostle  cer- 
tainly was,  devoting  his  life,  as  he  certainly  did,  to  the  teach- 
ing of  Christianity,  with  such  a  grand  intellect  as  he  certainly 
possessed,  could  assert  with  so  much  energy  a  doctrine  plain- 
ly contradicting  common  sense,  daily  observation,  the  plain 
teachings  of  Jesus,  and  his  own  uniform  doctrine  elsewhere. 

Some  persons  have  a  short  method  of  getting  over  the  dif- 
ficulty by  saying  that  Paul  did  not  himself  know  what  he 
meant.  They  assume  that  he  was  talking  at  random.  It 
would  be  about  as  wise,  when  we  open  Newton's  "  Principia," 
and  cannot  understand  it,  to  say  that  Newton  was  talking  at 
random  ;  or,  when  we  cannot  understand  Plato  or  some  other 
profound  metaphysician,  to  declare  directly  that  he  did  not 
himself  know  what  he  was  talking  about.  No  doubt,  this  is 
the  shortest  and  easiest  way  of  getting  out  of  such  difl[icul- 
ties,  but  perhaps  not  the  most  modest,  nor  the  most  wise. 

When  an  earnest  man,  a  profound  man,  a  man  in  the  high- 
est degree  practical,  a  man  who  has  done  the  greatest  work 
for  Christianity  which  has  been  done  since  its  foundation, 
sums  up  his  doctrine  in  a  comprehensive  maxim  like  this,  it 
is,  perhaps,  wise  to  admit,  at  once,  that  he  had  a  meaning,  and 
probably  an  important  one. 

"  No  doubt  he  had  a  meaning,"  it  may  be  said ;  '^  but  has 
he  any  meaning  now  f  His  formula  meant  something  for  the 
Jews  ;  but  does  it  mean  anything  for  us?  Is  not  this  mere- 
ly a  Jewish  question,  with  which  we  have  nothing  to  do?  " 

This  is  another  easy  way  of  getting  over  difficulties.  In 
reading  the  New  Testament,  when  we  come  to  a  place  where 
we  are  stopped  by  something  which  looks  deep  and  is  dark, 
we  are  often  told,  "  That  darkness  is  not  depth :  it  is  the 
shadow  of  a  Jewish  error  which  lies  across  the  path." 

Have  we  not  often  felt  dissatisfied,  when,  approaching 
some  great  saying  of  Christ  and  his  apostles  from  which  we 
hoped  to  gain  new  insight,  we  have  been  told,  "  That  has 


214  ORTHODOXY  :   ITS  TRUTHS    AND    ERRORS. 

nothinnr  to  do  with  us.  The  Jews  had  such  and  such  an 
opinion,  and  this  was  meant  to  show  them  their  mistake"? 
So  the  great  and  earnest  words  of  the  Bible,  which  we  thought 
to  be  full  of  spirit  and  life,  are  found  to  be  only  fossil  remains 
of  old  opinions,  of  opinions  long  since  passed  away  —  good 
for  nothing  but  to  be  put  into  the  museums  of  antiquaries, 
and  paraded  by  scholastic  pedants. 

But,  after  all,  take  it  on  the  lowest  ground,  were  not  the 
Jews  men  ?  Did  they  not,  as  a  race,  represent  some  element, 
common,  in  a  less  degree,  to  the  rest  of  mankind?  and  there- 
fore is  there  not  in  each  of  us  something  of  that  Jewish  ele- 
ment? Are  not  we  also  sometimes  Jews,  therefore  liable  to 
Jewish  errors,  and  needing  to  have  them  corrected?  The 
Jews  did  not  live  in  vain  :  their  struggles,  errors,  hopes,  were 
for  the  benefit  of  humanity.  We  were  to  learn  something  by 
their  mistakes,  and  to  be  taught  something  by  their  experience. 

Another  way  of  treating  such  a  passage  is  to  translate  it 
into  some  trivial,  insignificant  commonplace.  Thus,  we  are 
told,  our  doctrine  only  means  that  '■'■God  does  not  approve  a 
man  merely  for  going  through  a  routine  of  outward,  formal 
ceremonies,  hut  for  a  thoroughly  religious  life."  This  expla- 
nation assumes  that  the  apostle  is  here  talking  to  simpletons, 
and  that  what  he  says  is  no  more  worth  listening  to  by  us 
than  the  prattle  of  a  nurse  to  her  infant.  » 

There  are,  therefore,  four  ways  of  explaining  this  passage, 
none  of  which  are  satisfactory.     These  are,  that  Paul,  — 

1.  "Was  teaching  a  self-evident  absurdity  ; 

2.  Was  teaching  a  self-evident  truism  ; 

3.  Was  teaching  nothing,  and  only  talking  at  random ; 

4.  Was  correcting  a  Jewish  error,  which  only  the  Jews 
ever  had,  or  are  ever  likely  to  have. 

If  these  views  are  not  satisfactory  to  us,  the  simplest  way 
would  seem  to  be,  first,  to  endeavor  to  understand  precisely 
what  the  Jewish  error  was,  and  then  to  see  if  there  is  any- 
thing like  it  in  ourselves,  and  if  there  be  anything  which  we 


JUSTIFICATION    BY    FAITH,  215 

can  learn  from  this  old  argiinicut  whii-h  will  be,  not  old,  but 
new  for  our  time  and  for  all  time,  because  a  part  of  the  ten- 
dencies of  man.  Let  us  translate  these  old  terms  —  justifi- 
cation, faith,  tvorks  —  mio  their  modern  equivalents,  and  see 
•wliat  they  mean  for  us  at  the  present  time. 

"We  have   shown   that  we  may   be   mistaken    in    suppos- 
ing this  Orthodox  doctrine  of  justification  to  be  of  merely 
local   and   temporary  interest,  having   no  permanent  value. 
It  is  not  likely  that  a  man  like  Paul,  of  so  large,  so  deep,  so 
philosophic  a  mind,  should  have  devoted  himself  so  earnestly, 
and  returned  so  fondly,  to  a  theme  involving  no  universal  and 
ecernal  principles,  whose  interest  was  to  perish  with  the  hour. 
£t  is  not  probable  that,  in  this  small  volume  of  writings  of 
the  new  covenant,  —  this  precious  gift  of  God  to  the  world 
in  all  ages  and  in  every  nation,  —  so  large  a  portion  should 
be  devoted  to  a  wholly  temporary  argument ;  and,  more  tluin 
all,  it  is  a  most  remarkable  fact,  that  whenever  there  arises 
a  man  uniting  a  deeper  spirit  of  piety  with  a  larger  sense  of 
liberty  than  other  men,  —  a  man  commissioned  by  God  to 
give  a  new  religious  impulse  to  his  age,  and  to  help  Chris- 
tianity to  shake  itself  free  from  the  cumbrous  mass  of  human 
forms  and  traditions  which  have  crushed  it,  and  to  go  forth 
in  its  native  grace  and  loveliness  again,  —  some  profound  in- 
stinct should  always  lead  him  to  this  doctrine  as  to  a  weapon 
effectual  for  pulling  down  the  strongholds  of  bigotry,  scepti- 
cism,  and   spiritual    death.     Sir  James   Mackintosh    some- 
Avhere  says,  that  the  great  movement  which  shook  Christen- 
dom to  its  centre,  and  did  more  to  change  and  reform  society 
than  the  political  revolutions  and  wars  of  a  thousand  years, 
originated  with  an  obscure  Augustinian  monk  preaching  the 
doctrine   of  justification   by   faith.     This   acute   Scotchman 
saw,  what  all  must  see  who  read  Luther's  writings  with  any 
attention,  that  it  was  no  accident,  no  temporal  interest,  which 
led  him  to  lay  such  stress  on  this  doctrine.     It  was  the  soul 
of  his  preaching,  the  essence  of  hi.s  doctrine,  the  secret  of 


21B     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

his  strength,  the  life  of  his  life.  Aud  so,  when  Wesley  and 
the  early  Methodists  were  called  upon  to  pour  new  religious 
life  into  the  English  Church,  they  fell  back  on  this  doctrine 
—  this  ancient  sword  of  the  Spirit.  And  so  we  may  believe 
that  it  has  a  value  for  all  ages  ;  that  it  did  not  relate  merely 
to  Jewish  usages,  but  is  a  principle  of  vital  and  everlasting 
application. 

No  doubt  that  if  by  faith  we  understand  intellectual  be- 
lief, or  the  assent  to  opinions,  and  if  by  works  we  under- 
stand true  obedience,  and  by  justification  final  salvation  or 
actual  goodness,  there  can  scarcely  be  a  greater  absurdity 
than  to  say  that  a  man  is  justified  by  faith,  and  not  by 
works.  To  say  that  goodness,  in  the  sight  of  God,  consists 
in  receiving  certain  opinions,  rather  than  in  true  obedience, 
is  a  most  unscriptural  and  irrational  doctrine. 

But  none  of  the  great  reformers  of  whom  I  have  spoken, 
and  no  profound  theologians  of  any  sect  or  school,  have  ever 
held  the  doctrines  of  justification  by  faith  in  this  way. 
Neither  Lutlier  nor  Wesley  ever  made  faith  synonymous 
with  intellectual  belief  or  opinion.  "What  is  faith?"  said 
Wesley.  "  Not  an  opinion,  nor  any  number  of  opinions 
put  together,  be  they  ever  so  true.  A  string  of  opinions  is 
no  more  Christian  faith  than  a  string  of  beads  is  Christian 
holiness.  It  is  not  an  assent  to  any  opinion,  or  any  number 
of  opinions.  A  man  may  assent  to  three  or  three  and  twenty 
creeds,  he  may  assent  to  all  the  Old  and  New  Testament, 
and  yet  have  no  Christian  faith  at  all." 

But  what  is  the  true  doctrine  of  justification  by  faith,  as 
taught  in  the  Scriptures,  and  as  inspiring  these  great  reform- 
ers?    This  is  naturally  our  next  inquiry. 

§  3.  Need  of  Justification  for  the  Conscience.  —  There  is 
nothing  in  the  nature  of  man  more  paradoxical  than  con- 
science. It  is  that  which  lifts  him  to  God ;  and  yet  it  is 
that  which  makes  him  capable  of  sin,  and  without  which  he 
could  not  be  a  sinner.     It  gives  him  the  sense  of  right,  but 


JUSTIFICATION    BY    FAITH.  217 

at  the  same  time  makes  him  conscious  of  wrong.  It  makes 
him  capable  of  duty,  but  thereby  also  capable  of  disobedi- 
ence. It  shows  us  what  we  ought  to  do,  without  giving  us 
the  least  strength  wherewith  to  do  it.  It  condemns  us  for 
not  doing  right,  even  when  we  have  no  power  to  do  any- 
thing but  what  is  wrong.  It  shows  us  a  great  ideal  of  good- 
u(!ss  to  which  we  ought  to  aspire,  and  discourages  us  by  the 
very  loftiness  of  the  standard.  It  tells  us  in  the  same  breath 
tluit  we  are  sinners,  and  that  we  ought  to  be  angels.  It 
seems  at  the  same  time  to  elevate  and  degrade  us.  It  ele- 
vates us  by  giving  a  great  object  to  life,  and  making  it  seri- 
ous and  earnest ;  but  it  degrades  us  by  making  us  constantly 
ashamed  of  ourselves,  and  keeping  us  in  a  perpetual  state 
of  humiliation.  Now,  one  of  the  chief  peculiarities  of  the 
conscience  is,  that  beyond  a  certain  point,  the  more  we  try 
to  obey  it,  the  less  satisfaction  we  have.  We  know  that  this 
is  not  the  usual  theory.  We  are  commonly  told  that  the 
conscientious  man  is  always  contented  and  happy,  —  satis- 
fied with  himself,  and  at  peace  with  God.  But  facts  contra- 
dict this  theory.  The  conscientious  man  is  apt  to  be  very 
much  dissatisfied  with  himself,  —  much  more  so  than  the 
man  whose  conscience  is  torpid  and  indifferent.  There  is 
comfort  in  faithful  work  ;  no  doubt  there  is  great  content  in 
the  steady  performance  of  regular  duties  ;  but  here  con- 
science is  subordinate  to  work.  It  is  work  which  gives 
contentment ;  but  conscience,  when  throroughly  roused  by 
the  strong  meat  of  a  divine  law,  is  the  source  of  much  self- 
dissatisfaction.  How  can  it  be  otherwise?  It  shows  us  that 
we  ought  to  love  God  and  love  man  with  all  our  heart,  soul, 
mind,  strength.  Which  of  us  does  it?  Do  you?  Do  1? 
How  large  a  part  of  our  life  have  we  given  to  the  service  of 
God?  how  large  a  part  to  the  service  of  our  neighbor? 
How  often  do  we  thank  God  for  his  goodness?  How 
often  do  we  pray  to  him?  how  often  think  of  him?  If 
we  do  not  think  of  him,  of  course  we  do  not  love  him. 
19 


218     ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

Love  makes  us  very  thoughtful  of  another's  wishes. 
When  people  love  each  other,  they  joy  in  thinking  of  each 
other ;  they  treasure  souvenirs  of  each  other ;  they  like  to 
make  each  other  presents  of  things  they  think  will  please  ; 
they  steal  an  hour  from  daily  cares  or  nightly  rest  to  write 
letters  to  each  other.  Our  heavenly  Father's  arms  are 
ai'ound  us  all  day,  —  his  infinite  bounty  blessing  us,  his  care- 
ful providence  making  for  us  home,  friends,  all ;  yet  we  do 
not  think  of  him,  or  wish  to  do  anything  to  please  him. 

Conscience  tells  us  that  our  heart  is  hard  and  cold  to  our 
best  Friend  ;  and  that  is  by  no  means  a  pleasant  piece  of 
information. 

Moreover,  it  is  evident  that  this  condition  of  self-dissatis- 
faction is  not  a  good  one.  Self-reproach  may  he  a  wholesome 
medicine,  but  it  is  a  had  food.  We  cannot  do  our  work 
while  we  are  finding  fault  Avith  ourselves.  The  man  whose 
conscience  is  always  tormenting  him  is  in  a  morbid  state. 
He  is  a  spiritually  sick  man,  —  sick  of  too  much  medicine. 
What  must  be  done?  He  is  always  looking  at  his  sins,  and 
that  disqualifies  him  for  doing  his  duties.    What  shall  he  do? 

This  question  in  its  Jewish  form  is  stated  thus :  How 
SHALL  HE  BE  JUSTIFIED  BEFORE  GoD  ?  If  God  can  excuse 
him,  he  can  excuse  himself.  How,  then,  can  he  know  that 
God  looks  at  him  not  as  a  sinner,  but  as  a  just  man,  so  that 
he  can  look  on  himself  not  as  a  sinner,  but  as  a  just  man? 
This  is  the  problem.     What  are  its  solutions  ? 

In  the  Jewish  mind,  the  Jewish  law  had  brought  the  con- 
science into  an  extremely  irritable  state.  The  same  effect, 
in  a  less  degree,  is  produced  by  the  Catholic  confessional. 

§  4.  Reaction  of  Sin  on  the  Soul.  —  Now,  the  conse- 
quences of  sin  are  these  :  First,  every  act  of  sin  brings  after 
it  natural  evil  consequences.  It  weakens  the  strength  of  the 
soul,  it  darkens  the  spiritual  eye,  it  hardens  the  heart,  it 
adds  a  new  link  to  the  chain  of  evil  habit.  By  a  result  us 
inevitable  as  the  law  of  gravitation,  every  act  of  sin  pollutes. 


JUSTIFICATION    BY   FAITH.  219 

darkens,  wenkeus  the  .spiritual  principle  iu  man.  "  He  who 
sows  to  the  flesh  shall  ot  the  Uesli  reap  oorruptiou."  Wc  may 
call  these  results  the  external  consequences  of  sin,  because 
they  change  our  spiritual  relation  and  position  in  God's  exter- 
nal universe.  But  there  is  another  more  awful  and  as  inevita- 
ble consequence  of  sin.  It  alienates  us  from  God  himself.  It 
turns  our  face  from  the  Source  of  life  and  love.  It  makes  us 
at  war  with  him.  It  fills  us  with  the  sense  of  his  displeasure, 
and  burdens  us  with  the  consciousness  of  guilt.  To  escape  the 
dreadful  sense  of  his  auger,  we  hide  ourselves  from  him,  as 
Adam  did.  It  is  a  law  of  the  human  mind  that  we  dread  the 
sight  of  any  one  whom  we  have  wronged,  because  it  condemns 
us.  Perhaps  he  may  be  perfectly  w  illing  to  forgive  us  ;  per- 
haps he  does  not  even  know  that  we  have  wronged  him ;  but 
we  cannot  bear  to  see  him,  notwithstanding.  It  was  a  pro- 
found feeling  of  this  law  which  led  an  ancient  historian  to 
say,  "  He  hated  him  because  he  had  injured  him."  Thus  an 
active  conscience,  if  it  does  not  make  a  man  better,  will 
make  him  worse :  to  escape  its  torture  he  will  plunge  into 
new  crimes.  Some  of  the  darkest  crimes  which  stain  the 
page  of  history  may  be  traced  to  this  source,  —  to  the  opera- 
tion of  a  conscience  strong  enough  to  produce  the  sense  of ' 
guiJ.t,  but  not  'strong  enough  to  produce  the  determination  to 
reform.  It  is  related  that  when  the  mother  of  Charles  IX. 
of  France  and  his  uncles  were  urging  the  young  king  to 
consent  to  the  execution  of  some  of  the  principal  Protestants 
to  whom  he  was  strongly  attached,  after  a  long  resistance, 
when  he  at  last  gave  way,  it  Avas  with  these  remarkable 
words  :  "  I  consent,  then,  but  only  on  one  condition,  —  that 
you  do  not  leave  a  Huguenot  in  France  to  reproach  me  with 
it."  *  And  hence  the  Bartholomew  Massacre,  which  its  au- 
thors had  intended  before  only  to  include  a  few  individuals. 
So  sin  takes  occasion  by  the  law,  and  the  commandment 
ordained  for  life  becomes  death. 

•  See  Kaumer,  "  Gescbichte  Europas,"  zweiter  Band. 


220    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

The  same  principle  operates  with  respect  to  God.  We 
have  broken  his  laAv.  We  feel  that  he  must  be  displeased 
with  us ;  we  therefore  hide  ourselves  from  him,  turn  away 
from  him,  avoid  the  thought  of  him,  are  alienated  from  him. 
This  is  the  greatest  evil  of  sin,  and  this  we  may  call  the 
inward  consequence  of  sin,  because  it  affects  our  inward 
relation  to  God  rather  than  our  outward  relation  to  the 
universe. 

And  now,  how  are  we  to  be  reconciled  to  God?  How 
are  we  to  be  freed  from  this  sense  of  guilt  which  falls  on  us 
in  his  presence,  and  makes  us  fear  and  shun  him? 

§  5.  Different  Methods  of  obtaining  Forgiveness.  —  There 
are  two  ways  in  which,  when  we  have  injured  our  brother, 
and  so  have  become  estranged  from  him,  we  may  become 
reconciled  again,  and  freed  from  a  sense  of  shame  in  his 
presence.  One  is  by  endeavoring  to  atone  for  the  evil  we 
have  done  by  acts  of  kindness,  by  expressions  of  penitence. 
So  at  last  we  may  feel  that  we  have  done  him  far  more  good 
than  evil ;  and  though  he  may  not  forgive  us  or  be  recon- 
ciled to  us,  we,  on  our  part,  may  feel  freed  from  any  shame 
in  his  presence,  and  be  reconciled  to  him.  The  other  way 
'  is  by  his  coming  to  us,  and  promng  to  us,  by  his  conduct  aud 
-words,  that  he  is  not  estranged  from  us  by  our  bad  conduct ; 
that  he  loves  us  as  ever.  So  he  will  overcome  our  evU  by 
his  good,  and  reconcile  us  to  him. 

The  pagan  nations  in  all  ages  and  lands  have  taken  the 
first  way  of  being  reconciled  to  God.  Oppressed  by  a  guilty 
fear  of  their  terrible  idols,  they  have  brought  as  gifts  to  their 
altars  what  they  had  most  valuable ;  they  have  hung  their 
gold,  their  jewels,  in  the  temple  ;  they  have  slain  their  cattle 
on  the  shrine.  Still  unable  to  pacify  their  trembling  hearts, 
they  have  gone  farther,  and  sought  to  prove  the  sincerity  at 
least  of  their  repentance  by  self-inflicted  tortures,  and  by 
giving  even  their  children's  lives  to  the  bloody  power  whom 
they  worshipped.     Hence  sacrifices :  they  originated  in  the 


JUSTIFICATION    BY    FAITH.  221 

very  same  feeling  wliidi  iiuluces  a  man  to  give  a  present  to 
one  whom  he  has  wronged,  to  appease  him. 

Pagan  religions  are  founded,  therefore,  wholly  on  the  first 
mode  of  reconciliation.  The  offending  party  comes  to  him 
whom  he  has  injured,  and  does  something  to  pacify  him. 
But  these  religious  never  brought  peace  to  the  heart  of  the 
worfshipper.  After  the  wretched  mother  had  dropped  her 
iufant  into  the  burning  arms  of  Moloch,  she  still  had  no 
evidence  that  his  wrath  was  turned  away. 

In  the  religion  of  Moses,  the  first  mode  of  reconciliation 
was  united  with  the  second.  Pitying  the  weakness  of  man, 
the  law  allowed  him  to  bring  his  sacrifice  of  birds  or  beasts 
or  the  fruits  of  the  soil,  and  place  it  on  God's  altar  as  an  ex- 
piation and  atoning  offering  for  his  sin ;  and  then,  the  sup- 
pliant, having  faith  in  the  permanent  presence  of  God  in  the 
holy  of  holies,  was  received  again  to  favor  and  assured  of 
pardon.  The  Jew,  who  had  broken  any  of  the  laAvs  of  Je- 
hovah, kneAv  exactly  what  to  do  in  order  to  be  reconciled  to 
his  national  God  and  King.  God  had  pointed  out  the  way 
•which  he  would  accept.  By  certain  acts  of  sacrifice  and 
restitution,  the  Jew  became  once  more  woi'thy  of  living  under 
the  protecting  care  of  Jehovah. 

This  mode  of  reconciliation  under  the  law  was  far  superior 
to  that  in  pagan  religious.  It  gave  temporary  peace  to  the 
conscience,  though  not  permanent.  It  prevented  the  sinner 
from  going  farther  from  God,  though  it  did  not  unite  him 
with  God  in  unbroken  union.  It  kept  the  conscience  awake, 
and  prevented  it  from  being  hardened.  It  was  a  schoolmas- 
ter to  bring  the  Jews  to  .Christ.  It  was  a  preparation  for  a 
more  excellent  way.  In  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews,  the 
writer  declares  that  the  law  was  but  the  shadow  of  that  which 
was  to  come ;  that  it  could  not,  "  by  the  sacrifices  oftered 
year  by  year,  make  the  comers  thereunto  perfect ;  for  then 
would  they  have  ceased  to  have  been  offered,  because  the 
worshippers,  once  purged,  would  have  had  no  more  conscience 
19* 


222     ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

of  sin."  The  sacrifice  made  no  revelation  of  God's  charac- 
ter and  love,  planted  no  root  of  piety  in  the  heart :  it  relieved 
the  conscience  only  for  this  once,  only  with  respect  to  this 
one  sin  ;  and  there  its  influence  ended.  And  therefore  was 
a  new  covenant  necessary,  and  promised  by  the  prophets, 
and  looked  forward  to  by  holy  men,  when  they  should  be 
reconciled  not  by  works,  but  by  faith. 

We  have  seen  that  there  are  two  modes  by  which  aliena- 
tion may  be  removed :  first,  by  the  oiFending  party  doing 
something  to  atone  for  his  offence  ;  second,  by  the  injured 
one  showing  that  he  has  forgiven  the  offence,  and  is  ready 
to  be  reconciled  without  an  atonement.  The  first  mode  is 
the  way  of  reconciliation  in  pagan  religions  ;  the  first  and 
second  are  united  in  the  Jewish  religion ;  the  second  is  the 
mode  in  the  Christian  religion. 

§  6.  Method  in  Christianity.  —  In  Christianity,  in  the 
gospel  of  grace,  God  ofi^ers  pardon  freely  to  those  who  are 
willing  to  accept  it.  He  is  ready  now  to  receive  those  who 
are  ready  to  come  to  him.  It  is  only  necessary  to  believe 
this  in  order  to  be  reconciled.  We  are,  theretbre,  reconciled 
by  faith. 

But  we  are  said  to  be  reconciled  by  the  death  and  blood 
of  Christ.  How  is  this  ?  We  have  seen  the  source  of  our 
alienation :  it  lay  not  in  God,  but  in  ourselves.  God  had 
not  gone  away  from  us  ;  Ave  went  away  from  him.  He  had 
not  ceased  to  love  us  ;  but  by  a  terrible  reaction  from  our 
sinfulness,  we  had  ceased  to  believe  in  his  love.  "  God's 
hand,"  says  the  prophet  (Isa.  59  :  2),  "  is  not  shortened,  that 
he  cannot  save,  nor  is  his  ear  grown  dull,  that  he  cannot 
hear ;  but  your  iniquities  have  separated  you  from  your 
God,  and  your  sins  have  hidden  his  face  from  you,  that  he 
doth  not  hear."  By  an  immutable  law  of  our  mind,  God's 
wrath  abides  on  us,  and  we  cannot  believe  in  his  love. 
Here  is  the  source  of  our  alienation.  Now,  merely  to  be  told 
that  God  is  merciful  does  not  wholly  help  the  matter.    True, 


JUSTIFICATION    BY    FAITH.  223 

wc  say,  He  is  niercilul,  but  uot  to  us  ;  we  have  sinned  too 
long  and  deeply.  Something  must  be  done,  then,  to  con- 
vince us  that  God  is  ready  to  forgive  and  receive  us  freely. 
The  death  of  Christ  is  the  fact  which  produces  this  convic- 
tion. The  death  of  Christ,  therefore,  is  not  merely  an 
emblem  of  God's  love,  but  an  act  of  God's  love.  It  draws 
us  to  him.  It  changes  our  hearts.  It  melts  our  doubt,  our 
distrust.  It  reveals  to  us  our  Father's  love.  The  blood  of 
Christ  makes  those  who  were  afar  off  nigh.  This  all  expe- 
rience teaches  as  a  matter  of  fact.  It  is  the  cross  of  Christ, 
borne  by  the  simple  missionary,  preached  by  the  devout 
Moravian,  which,  amid  the  ice  of  Greenland  or  beneath  the 
burning  sun  of  the  tropic,  I'econciles  the  sinner  to  God. 

And  if  one  asks  how  the  death  of  Christ  does  this,  we  will 
briefly  indicate  what  we  believe  to  be  the  way  in  which  it 
operates.  We  look  at  Christ,  and  see  the  brightness  of 
God's  glory  and  expi-ess  image  of  his  person.  We  see  a 
Uoliness  pure  and  perfect,  a  character  infinitely  beautiful  and 
lovely.  We  see  how  dear  and  near  such  a  one  must  have 
been  to  God  ;  and  we  hear  God  say,  "  This  is  my  beloved 
Son,  in  whom  I  am  well  pleased  ;  "  and  we  hear  him  say  of 
God,  "  My  Father  has  not  left  me  alone  ;  for  I  do  always 
the  things  which  please  him." 

And  now  Ave  look  at  the  world,  and  see  it  "  lying  in  wick- 
edness ; "  we  see  men  trampling  on  God's  law,  polluting  his 
image,  cruelly  oppressing  each  other,  and  boldly  defying  and 
mocking  at  the  Almighty.  What  does  he  then  ?  For  the 
sake  of  these  miserable,  weak,  and  wretched  sinners,  who 
seem  scarcely  worth  the  saving,  he  sends  his  holy  child 
among  them ;  he  sends  this  pure  being  to  have  his  heart 
rent  with  the  sight  and  knowledge  of  human  sin  ;  he  sends 
him  to  be  cruelly  and  shamefully  killed  by  a  death  of  agony, 
in  order  that  ive,  sinful  and  miserable,  may  be  reconciled. 
We  say,  in  the  view  of  all  this,  "  He  who  spared  not  his  own 
Son,  but  delivered  him  up  for  us,  how  shall  he  not  with  him 


224      ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

freely  give  us  all  things?"  We  say,  "  God  commended  his 
love  towards  us,  in  that,  while  we  were  sinners,  Christ  died 
for  us."  "  Herein  is  love  ;  not  that  we  loved  God,  but  that 
he  loved  us."  Christ,  "  being  lifted  up,  draws  all  men  unto 
him."  Thus,  in  the  midst  of  the  gloom  of  that  horrible  scene 
on  Calvary,  when  the  power  of  darkness  was  at  its  height,  — 
that  crisis  of  the  world,  when  human  sin  stood  at  the  floc^d, 
—  the  heavens  were  opened,  and  a  new  ray  of  divine  love 
poured  into  the  world. 

§  7.  Result.  —  Let  us  sum  up,  then,  the  doctrine  of  justi- 
fication by  faith,  as  we  have  now  explained  it. 

1.  Justification  is  not  the  doing  away  Avith  all  the  con- 
sequences of  sin,  but  only  the  consequence  which  consists  in 
present  alienation  from  God.  It  is  objectively,  as  a  divine 
act,  Avhat /orr/iveness  is  subjectively,  as  a  human  experience. 
It  relates  to  present  acceptance  with  God ;  it  is  not  the  can- 
celling of  the  results  of  our  past  sins  on  the  character,  nor  is 
it  the  hope  of  future  salvation.     It  relates  to  the  present. 

The  following  passages  show  that  justification  is  equivalent 
to  reconciliation  or  forgiveness.  Rom.  5  :  8-10  :  "  But  God 
commendeth  his  love  toward  us,  in  that,  while  we  were  yet 
sinners,  Christ  died  for  us.  Much  more  then,  being  now 
justified  by  his  blood,  we  shall  be  saved  from  wrath  through 
him.  For  if,  when  we  were  enemies,  we  were  reconciled  to 
God  by  the  death  of  his  Son,  much  more,  being  reconciled, 
we  shall  be  saved  by  his  life."  Rom.  4  :  6-8  :  "  David  also 
describeth  the  blessedness  of  the  man  unto  whom  God  im- 
puteth  righteousness  without  works  ;  saying.  Blessed  are  they 
whose  iniquities  are  forgiven,  and  whose  sins  are  covered. 
Blessed  is  the  man  to  whom  the  Lord  will  not  impute  sin." 

2.  Faith  is  not  mere  intellectual  belief  or  opinion  ;  nor  is 
it  mere  feeling,  nor  a  mystical  emotion  in  which  we  are 
wholly  passive  ;  but  a  sentiment,  in  which  belief,  feeling,  and 
determination  are  blended  together.  The  belief  is  that  Christ 
is  the  Son  of  God  ;  the  feeling  is  trust  and  joy  in  the  love  of 


JUSTIFICATION    BY    FAITH.  225 

God  seen  in  him  ;  and  the  determination  is  to  rely  on  him  as 
a  Mediator  and  Saviour. 

That  faith  is  not  a  mere  intellectual  belief,  but  involves 
also  a  fooling  of  trust,  appears  from  such  passages  as  these : 
"  If  thou  believe  in  thy  heart ;  "  "  An  evil  heart  of  unbelief." 

That  faith  is  not  a  mere  emotion,  in  which  we  are  wholly 
passive,  appears  from  such  cases  as  those  where  men  are  ex- 
horted to  believe,  as  a  thing  in  their  own  power. 

3.  Works,  in  this  doctrine,  include  every  effort  to  recon- 
cile God  by  offering  him  anything  in  expiation  of  our  sin, 
whether  sacrifices,  sacraments,  the  assent  to  creeds,  the 
struggle  after  feelings  and  experiences,  or  reformation  of 
character. 

And  the  whole  doctrine  of  justification  by  faith  may  be 
thus  expressed :  — 

If  you  are  bui'dened  with  a  sense  of  unworthiness  and 
guilt ;  if  something  seems  to  separate  your  heart  from  God  ; 
if  you  want  confidence  to  come  to  him  boldly  in  prayer,  — 
do  not  try  to  remove  this  difficulty  by  any  effort  to  do  some- 
thing different,  or  become  something  different ;  but  simply 
look  at  Jesus  in  his  sufferings  and  death,  and  see  your 
heavenly  Father  calling  you  to  him  noiu  to  be  forgiven.  Go 
at  once  to  God  through  Christ.  Repose  on  that  love  that  will 
cleanse  you,  that  will  save  you  ;  and  nevermore  doubt,  even 
in  your  darkest  hour,  that  your  Father  is  ready  to  hear,  to 
forgive,  and  bless  you. 

§  8.  Its  History  in  the  Church.  -^  We  have  seen  the  ori- 
gin, nature,  and  value  of  this  doctrine.  Let  us  now  look  at 
its  history. 

The  apostolic  Church  was  founded  on  the  simple  doctrine 
of  faith  in  Christ.  It  was  not  founded  on  any  theory  or 
speculation  about  Christ,  or  about  his  plan  of  salvation,  but 
on  Christ  himself  as  the  Saviour.  All  that  the  first  Chris- 
tians professed  was  faith  in  Jesus  as  the  Son  of  God.  They 
had  been  reconciled  to  God  by  him  ;  they  were  at  peace  with 


226  ORTHODOXY:    ITS    TRUTHS    AND    ERRORS. 

» 
God  ;  they  were  washed  in  the  blood  of  the  Lamb  ;  and  they 

were  happy.  A  deep  and  wonderful  joy  brooded  over  the 
early  church.  A  hurricane  of  persecution  and  war  raged 
around  them  :  within  the  Church,  all  v/as  security  and  peace. 
How  beautiful  are  the  expressions  by  which  the  apostles  de- 
scribe the  serenity  and  joy  of  the  Church  !  "  They  ate  their 
meat  in  gladness  and  singleness  of  heart,  praising  God,  and 
having  favor  with  all  the  people."  New  converts  "  gladly 
received  the  word,  and  were  baptized  "  by  thousands,  in  tho 
face  of  the  bitterest  persecution.  "The  multitude  of  them 
that  believed  were  of  one  heart  and  one  soul ;  neither  said 
any  of  them,  that  anght  of  the  things  that  he  possessed  was 
his  own."  Whence  came  all  this  peace  and  union  in  the 
early  Church?  Was  it  because  they  had  attained  to  such 
clear  views  of  truth,  and  all  held  the  same  opinions?  So 
far  from  it,  some  had  not  heard  that  there  was  a  Holy 
Ghost ;  others  did  not  believe  in  a  resurrection  of  the  dead  ; 
and  many  thought  the  whole  Jewish  ritual  essential  to  salva- 
tion. Was  it  that  they  had  become  suddenly  pure  in  heart, 
and  holy  in  life,  and  freed  from  sin?  So -far  from  it,  we 
find  the  apostles  exhorting  them  against  very  great  vices, 
—  against  murder,  theft,  and  licentiousness,  —  and  condemn- 
ing them  for  having  practised  gross  immoralities.  It  came 
from  the  simplicity  of  their  faith.  They  looked  to  Jesus, 
and  their  faces  were  lightened.  They  saw  the  love  of  God 
in  him  ;  they  felt  it  in  their  hearts ;  they  reposed  on  it  un- 
doubtingly.  In  quietness  and  confidence  was  their  strength. 
O,  happy  days  !  in  which  men's  minds  had  not  yet  been 
harassed  by  thousands  of  vain  controversies  and  empty  ver- 
bal disputes  ;  by  questions,  and  strifes  of  words  ;  by  most 
profound  theological  discussions,  ending  in  nothing  but  wea- 
riness ;  but  were  satisfied,  that,  if  men  Avould  go  to  Christ, 
they  would  find  truth.  O,  happy  time  !  in  which  men  had 
not  learned  to  dissect  their  own  hearts,  and  pry  curiously 
into  their  feelings,  and  torture  themselves  by  anxious  efforts 


JUSTIFICATION    BY    FAITH.  227 

to  feel  right,  and  tormenting  doubts  as  to  whether  their 
inward  experiences  wci'c  as  they  ought  to  be,  but  believed 
that  all  good  feelings  would  come  in  their  own  time  out  of 
Christian  faith.  O,  happy,  golden  hour  !  when  love,  and  joy, 
and  duty  were  all  one  ;  when  men  did  not  prescribe  for  them- 
selves and  others  a  task-work,  an  outward  routine  of  duties; 
but  had  confidence,  that,  if  they  lived  iu  the  Spirit,  they 
would  also  walk  iu  the  Spirit. 

That  hour  of  simple,  child-like  faith  passed  away.  Its  de- 
cay appeared  in  a  return  to  the  old  moc^p  of  justification.  In- 
stead of  simply  relying  on  what  God  had  done,  men  must  do 
something  themselves  to  atone  for  their  sins ;  they  must  do 
penance,  and  have  priests,  and  sacraments,  and  masses,  and 
countless  ceremonies  to  come  between  them  and  God ;  they 
must  pile  up  a  cumbrous  fabric  of  religious  and  moral  works, 
by  which  to  climb  up  to  God ;  until,  at  last,  though  the  doc- 
trine of  justification  by  faith  was  never  given  up,  it  was 
made  of  none  effect  by  the  rubbish  of  human  ceremonies 
heaped  before  it.  And  then  came  Luther,  armed  with  the 
old  doctrine,  to  sweep  these  all  away,  and  call  men  back  to 
the  simple  faith  in  the  Saviour.  The  pure  word  of  faith 
went  forth  through  all  lands,  conquering  and  to  conquer. 

But  there  is  a  continual  tendency  to  fall  back  again  from 
faith  upon  works.  Ever  as  the  life  of  religion  weakens,  ever 
as  the  strength  of  holy  confidence  decays,  men  betake  them- 
selves to  some  outward  forms  or  efforts.  When  they  cease 
to  lean  on  the  love  of  God,  they  begin  to  lean  on  sacraments 
and  ceremonies,  on  opinions  and  doctrines,  on  feelings  and 
experiences,  on  morality  and  woi'ks  of  duty.  Ever,  as  the 
cold  winter  of  worldliness  and  sin  causes  the  stream  of  holy 
faith  to  shrink  back  into  its  channel,  the  ice  of  forms  accu- 
mulates along  its  shores  ;  and  then,  as  the  inevitable  conse- 
quence and  sign  of  the  decay  of  faith,  we  find  the  Church 
becoming  anxious  and  troubled,  confidence  giving  way  to 
anxiety,  cheerfulness   to   gloom,  hope  to  fear.     Everything 


228     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

terrifies  the  unbelieving  Cliurch  ;  new  opinions  terrify  it ; 
new  measures  terrify  it.  It  has  ashes  instead  of  beauty, 
mourning  for  joy,  the  spirit  of  heaviness  instead  of  the  gar- 
ment of  praise. 

§  9.  Orthodox  Errors^  at  the  present  Time,  in  Regard  to  JuS' 
tification  hy  Faith.  —  We  have  said  that  there  is  a  constant 
tendency  to  fall  back  from  faith  to  works  of  some  kind  or 
other.  The  important  question  comes.  How  is  it  with  us 
now  ?  Does  this  tendency  show  itself  in  our  present 
churches?  And  the.answer  we  are  compelled  to  make  is, 
that  it  does,  certainly  to  some  extent,  and  in  all  the  churches. 
Orthodox  churches  have  fallen  away,  more  or  less,  from  the 
doctrine  of  justification  by  faith.  They  have  fallen  back 
from  the  central  point  of  Christianity,  faith  in  Jesus,  in  dif- 
ferent directions,  and  seek  to  be  justified  by  a  law,  —  some 
upon  a  law  of  belief,  and  others  on  a  law  of  emotion. 

Do  not  understand  us  as  saying  that  any  of  the  churches 
have  denied,  or  that  they  do  not  constantly  teach,  the  doc- 
trine of  justification  by  faith.  This  is  not  the  point.  The 
Romish  Church  never  denied,  nor  ceased  to  teach,  this  doc- 
trine ;  but  she  virtually  abolished  it,  and  made  it  of  none 
effect  by  teaching  other  things  also.  Is  not  this,  to  some 
-degree,  the  case  now? 

Are  there  not  many  Orthodox  Christians,  at  the  present 
time,  who  seek  to  make  their  peace  with  God,  not  by  relying 
on  Jesus  himself,  but  on  some  theory  Avith  respect  to  his 
nature  or  person  ;  not  on  his  death,  but  on  some  speculation 
about  his  death,  —  some  theory,  scheme,  or  plan?  Is  it  not 
the  idea  of  many,  that  they  are  to  be  brought  to  God,  not  by 
faith  in  Jesus  and  his  death,  but  by  assenting  to  the  correct 
doctrine  about  it?  and  accordingly  they  anxiously  labor,  and 
make  it  a  work,  to  believe  in  the  true  theory,  in  order  that 
they  may  be  brought  to  God.  We  do  not  say  that  correct 
opinions  on  these  points  are  unimportant ;  but  we  say  that 
the  faith  in  Christ  which  justifies  us  does  not  come  from 


JUSTIFICATION    BY    FAITH.  229 

believing  right  opinions,  but  tluit  right  opinions  come  from  the 
justifying  iiiith.  Are  religious  teachers  now  willing  to  do  as 
Paul  did,  and  say  simply,  "  Believe  on  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ "  ? 
or  do  they  not  rather  find  it  necessary  to  say,  "  Believe  this, 
that,  and  the  other  thing,  about  Jesus  Christ"? 

And  again  :  is  it  not  thought  by  Orthodox  people,  that,  in 
order  to  be  justified  and  have  peace  with  God  through  Jesus 
Christ,  it  is  necessary  that  a  person  should  experience  cer- 
tain feelings,  beginning  with  a  sense  of  guilt,  a  fear  of  pun- 
ishment, and  passing  into  a  state  of  hope  and  assurance? 
And,  accordingly,  men  make  it  a  work,  and  labor,  to  have 
these  feelings  in  the  precise  order  and  manner,  and,  until 
they  can  experience  these  feelings,  believe  that  they  can  have 
no  access  to  God.  As  before,  we  do  not  mean  that  these 
feelings  are  unimportant,  but  only  that  we  should  not  try  to 
work  ourselves  up  into  certain  feelings  in  order  to  be  just 
before  God.  It  is  faith  in  Jesus  Avhich  is  the  sottrce,  not  the 
result,  of  piety  as  well  as  of  holiness.  It  is  faith  in  God's 
love  to  us  which  enables  us  to  love  him.  The  sense  of  par- 
don produces  both  the  feeling  of  gratitude  and  of  unworthi- 
ness.  God  does  not  forgive  us  because  we  have  had  the 
right  feelings,  but  that  we  may  have  them.  Those  love 
much  to  whom  much  is  forgiven  ;  but  to  whom  little  is  for- 
given, the  same  love  little. 

"Were  we  ever  struck  with  the  remarkable  contrast  between 
the  conversions  to  God  in  the  apostolic  time  and  those  which 
we  hear  of  now  ?  How  much  more  simple  they  were  !  A 
man  is  riding  in  a  chariot,  reading  his  Bible,  and  trying  in 
vain  to  comprehend  it.  An  apostle  comes,  aud  explains  to 
him  the  prophecy,  and  applies  it  to  Jesus.  Presently  they 
come  tc  water,  and  he  says,  "  See,  here  is  water ; "  he  is 
baptized,  and  goes  on  his  way  rejoicing.  We  fear  there  are 
not  many  churches  now  who  would  receive  that  Ethiopian  as 
a  member,  if  he  could  give  no  further  account  of  his  religious 
experience  than  is  recorded  in  the  book  of  Acta. 
20 


230     ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

But  is  it  not,  we  say  again,  remarkable,  that  not  only  in 
this  case,  but  in  all  the  cases  of  conversion  recorded  and 
described  in  the  Acts,  there  should  be  nothing  of  the  descrip- 
tious  which  we  read  every  week  in  our  religious  newspapers? 
In  the  case  of  the  three  thousand  baptized  on  the  day  of  Pen- 
tecost, we  only  read  that  they  were  cut  to  the  heart ;  said, 
"What  shall  we  do?"  were  told  to  repent  and  be  baptized; 
joyfully  received  the  word,  and  were  baptized.  Even  the 
remarkable  conversion  of  Paul  was  nothing  like  what  we 
now  have.  How  is  this  —  that  now  we  are  not  willing  to 
trust  to  a  simple  act  of  faith  in  Jesus  Christ,  and  in  turning 
to  God ;  but  we  have  a  scale  and  rule  of  religious  experi- 
ence—  a  work  which  all  must  go  through  in  order  to  be 
justified? 

And  what  is  the  result  of  thus  substituting  for  justification 
by  faith,  justification  by  belief  in  opinions,  and  by  processes 
of  feeling?  Look  at  the  churches  where  this  has  been  car- 
ried farthest,  and  see  the  result.  Religion  becomes  gloomy, 
anxious,  and  austere ;  it  ceases  lo  breathe  cheerfulness  and 
joy  around  ;  the  gentler  graces  die  before  it ;  fear  treads  fast 
in  the  footsteps  of  hope  ;  a  stiff  formality  introduces  cant  in 
the  place  of  what  is  natural  and  artless  ;  the  heart  is  stretched 
on  a  rack  of  self-torturing  doubts  and  anxieties.  The  biog- 
raphies and  private  journals  of  many  eminent  saints  show 
us  how  little  happiness  they  had  in  their  religion,  —  how 
they  were  tortured  by  spiritual  doubts,  perplexities,  and 
anxieties.  The  reason  is,  that  they  rely  on  their  oivn  feelings, 
instead  of  relying  on  Christ. 

And  with  the  reliance  placed  on  theory  and  opinion  van- 
ishes the  union  of  the  Church.  There  are  five  sects  in  this 
country,  all  holding  to  the  Assembly's  Catechism  —  a  large 
and  minute  compendium  of  opinions,  —  and  yet  which  often 
do  not  allow  each  other  to  commune  at  the  Lord's  table. 
The  New  School  Presbyterians  might  permit  the  others  to 
commune  with  therrij  but  are  themselves  excluded.     The  Old 


JUSTIFICATION    BY    FAITH.  231 

School  Presbyterians  would  commune  with  all  but  the  New, 
but  are  not  permitted.  Nay,  the  Associate  Reformed,  the 
Covenanters,  and  the  Seceders  carry  it  so  far  as  to  discipline 
and  excommunicate  their  members  for  what  is  called  occa- 
sional hearing;  i.  e.,  attending  worship  at  other  churches 
than  their  own.  There  was  in  the  State  of  Indiana  an  Old 
School  preacher,  and  president  of  a  college,  who  refused  to 
allow  a  Unitarian  to  give  a  literary  address  which  the  stu- 
dents had  asked  him  to  give,  and  which  he  had  gone  to 
deliver,  and,  in  defending  himself  for  this,  called  him  a 
"public  propagator  of  infidelity  ;"  and  within  a  mile  or  two 
of  his  college  thei-e  was  a  society  of  Seceders,  or  Covenant- 
ers, holding,  like  himself,  the  Assembly's  Confession,  who 
would  excommunicate  any  of  their  members  who  should  go 
to  hear  him  preach. 

There  is,  then,  a  tendency  among  the  Orthodox  to  rely  on 
their  own  opinion  and  their  own  feelings,  rather  than  on  Jesus 
Christ. 

§  10.  Errors  of  Liberal  Christians. — Liberal  Christians 
have  fallen  into  error  of  a  different  sort.  They  seek  to  be 
justified,  not  by  opinion  nor  by  feeling,  but  by  action ;  by 
works  of  righteousness,  honesty,  charity  ;  by  the  faithful 
performance  of  social  duties ;  by  an  active  obedience  to  the 
law  of  God.  Looking  at  the  Scriptures,  and  seeing  in  how 
many  places  we  are  plainly  taught  that  we  are  to  work  out 
our  own  salvation ;  to  be  rewarded  and  punished  according 
to  our  active  goodness  ;  to  be  judged  by  our  works,  —  they 
say  that  a  man  is  forgiven  when  he  has  corrected  his  fault, 
and  not  before  ;  that  repentance  and  reformation  are  the  only 
means  of  atonement  with  God  ;  that,  if  we  wish  to  be  for- 
given, we  must  reform  our  conduct  and  change  our  character. 
Accordingly,  they  lay  great  stress  on  duty,  and  are  contin- 
ually exhorting  men  to  the  performance  of  their  duties  in 
order  to  be  forgiven. 

But  there  is  a  mistake  here  also,  which  arises  from  con- 


232  ORTHODOXY  :    ITS    TRUTHS    AND    ERRORS. 

fouudiug  two  very  different  things  ;  namely,  justification  and 
final  salvation.  We  have  seen  that  the  consequences  of  sin 
are  twofold  —  external  and  internal.  The  inward  conse- 
quence of  sin  is  separation  from  God ;  the  external  is  the 
weakening  and  debasing  of  the  soul.  The  first  consequence 
is  removed  by  faith ;  the  second,  by  obedience.  Every  act 
of  sin  pollutes,  darkens,  and  ruins  the  soul ;  every  act  of 
obedience  strengthens,  elevates,  and  saves  it.  Obedience, 
persevered  in  to  the  end,  insures  the  salvation  of  the  soul. 
But,  in  order  that  we  may  obey,  we  must  first  be  justified; 
for  what  is  to  give  us  the  strength  and  the  heart  to  obey,  ex- 
cept the  pardoning  love  of  God?  It  is  this  sense  of  reconcil- 
iation,—  it  is  this  spirit  of  adoption,  whereby  we  cry,  "  Abba, 
Father,"  —  which  gives  us  the  power  to  obey.  We  do  not 
obey  God  to  be  forgiven  ;  but  we  are  forgiven  that  we  may 
obey.  Have  we  read  the  Gospels,  and  have  we  forgotten  all 
the  instances  in  which  Jesus  said,  "  Thy  sins  are  forgiven 
thee,"  before  there  had  been  any  change  of  conduct,  or  re- 
form of  character?  and  have  we  forgotten  the  memorable 
passage  in  which  he  explains  to  the  captious  Pharisee  why 
he  does  this  (Luke  7:36-50),  —  on  the  principle  that  the 
one  to  whom  the  most  is  forgiven  will  love  the  most? 
.  To  point  out  to  men  their  duties,  and  tell  them  to  do  them, 
does  not  enable  them  to  do  them  ;  but  the  sight  of  God's  love 
in  Jesus  Christ  does  create  in  them  new  strength.  That  true 
follower  of  Jesus,  the  first  of  our  Ministers  at  Large,  Dr. 
Tuckerman,  did  not  say  to  the  poor  victim  of  sin,  that 
when  he  reformed  his  conduct,  he  would  be  his  friend.  No  : 
like  his  Master,  he  showed  himself  his  friend  while  he  was 
yet  a  sinner,  and  so  gave  him  hope  and  courage  to  break 
away  from  his  sin.  He  has  left  on  record  one  of  the  most 
touching  instances  of  the  power  of  love  to  melt  down  the  im- 
penitent heart,  in  the  case  of  a  convict  whom  he  persisted  in 
visiting,  though  he  was  perfectly  hardened,  and  filled  with 
bitterness  and  rage..    He   persisted  in   patient  attempts  to 


JUSTIFICATION    BY    FAITH.  233 

soften  liis  lieart,  till  he  suuceeded,  by  the  irresistible  power  of 
love,  iu  making  him  humble  as  a  little  child.  Suppose  he 
had  sent  him  word,  that  if  he  repented,  and  showed  the 
proper  spirit,  he  would  come  and  visit  him.  He  had  not  so 
learned  God  or  Christ.  He  knew  that  he  must  overcome 
evil  with  good.  Exactly  so  does  God  overcome  our  evil 
with  good. 

To  tell  men  to  do  their  duties  that  they  may  be  forgiven, 
is  to  tell  them  to  do  what  they  have  no  power  to  do.  A  con- 
fident reliance  on  God's  love,  and  steadfast  communion  wiJi 
him,  are  the  only  source  of  real  improvement.  When  we  feel 
these,  we  are  one  with  God  ;  when  we  can  go  to  him  confi- 
dently, as  children  to  a  father  ;  when  we  can  betake  ourselves 
to  his  love  in  every  emergency  of  life.  —  we  have  a  source 
of  real  strength,  and  growth,  and  improvement  within  us. 
But,  without  this  feeling  of  peace  with  God,  the  effort  to  do 
our  duties  only  harasses  and  irritates  our  conscience  :  it  pro- 
duces weariness  of  heart,  a  constant  feeling  of  unworthiness 
and  failure,  a  constant  sense  of  obligations  and  responsibili- 
ties which  we  do  not  and  cannot  fulfil.  Duty  is  a  weary 
task,  a  heavy  burden  ;  and  our  life  is  crushed  down  by  con- 
stant anxiety  and  care.  But  if  we  begin  right,  and  come  to 
God  first,  and  lean  on  his  love,  and  rely  on  his  promise,  then 
we  are  filled  with  hope  and  joyful  assurance,  and  failure  does 
not  dismay  us,  for  we  say,  "  God's  truth  is  pledged  for  our 
success  ;  and  if,  while  we  were  enemies,  we  were  reconciled 
to  God  by  the  death  of  his  Son,  much  more,  being  reconciled, 
we  shall  be  saved  by  his  life." 

It  may  be  objected  that  it  is  dangerous  to  religion  to  admit 
that  we  can  be  justified  before  we  have  believed  certain  im- 
portant doctrines  or  experienced  certain  peculiar  feelings.  It 
may  also  be  objected,  on  the  other  liand,  that  it  is  dangerous 
to  morality  to  suppose  that  pardon  can  precede  reformation. 
But  the  more  we  read  the  Scriptures,  the  more  we  look  into 
our  own  heart,  and  the  more  we  become  acquainted  with  our 
20* 


234     ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

fiellow-meu,  the  deeper  is  our  conviction,  that  there  is  but  one 
source  of  true  piety  and  sound  morality  —  a  heart  reconciled 
to  God,  and  at  peace  with  him.  We  do  not  undervalue  cor- 
rect belief,  deep  feeling,  or  active  obedience  ;  but  we  place 
them  where  they  belong.  They  are  the  fruit  of  the  tree,  not 
the  root  of  the  tree.  The  root  and  source  and  beginning  of 
all  I  icty  and  holiness  is  simple  faith  in  God  through  Christ. 
Wc  must  ask  ourselves,  therefore,  first  of  all,  "  Ai'e  we  recon- 
ciled to  God,  or  are  we  not?  Are  we  living  in  filial  com- 
munion with  him,  or  living  without  him  in  the  world?"  If 
unreconciled,  we  must  not  think  to  work  ourselves  up  into  a 
degree  of  goodness  or  pious  feeling  without  God.  There  is 
no  strength  Avhere  there  is  no  confidence,  whei*e  there  is 
nothing  to  lean  on,  where  there  is  hollowness  within.  We 
ought  to  come  at  once  to  God.  We  ought  to  lift  our  hearts 
to  him,  not  saying,  "  Who  shall  go  up  to  heaven  for  us, 
to  bring  him  to  us  ?  Who  shall  go  over  the  sea  for  us  ? " 
For  his  word  is  very  nigh,  in  our  mouth  and  heart. 

The  above  discussion  will  show  what  we  consider  to  be  the 
truths,  and  what  the  errors,  in  the  Orthodox  view  of  justifi- 
cation by  faith. 


ORTHODOX  IDEA  OF  THE  ATONEMENT.      235 


CHAPTER    X. 

ORTnODOX  IDEA  OF  THE   ATONEMENT. 

§  1.  Confusion  in  the  Orthodox  Statement.  —  The  snbjeot 
of  this  chapter  is  the  Orthodox  doctrine  of  the  work  of  Chri.st, 
and  especially  of  the  atonement. 

No  doctrine  of  Orthodoxy  is  more  dilhcult  to  state  to  the 
satisfaction  of  the  Orthodox  than  this.  The  reason  is,  that 
there  is  no  doctrine  concerning  which  the  Orthodox  differ  so 
much  among  themselves.  There  is  no  diHiculty  in  stating 
the  Orthodox  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  ;  for  this  is  the  same,  or 
nearly  the  same,  in  the  symbols  of  all  the  Orthodox  sects. 
The  Roman  Catholic  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  is  essentially  the 
same  with  that  of  the  Presbyterian,  Lutheran,  Methodist,  and 
Episcopal  Churches.  But  not  sO  with  the  doctrine  of  Christ's 
reconciling  and  atoning  work.  This  has  taken  every  form  in 
past  history,  and  is  altogether  unsettled  at  the  present  time. 
Usually,  many  views  are  mingled  together  in  modern  Ortho- 
doxy ;  and  while  all  Orthodox  teachers  use  the  same  language, 
speaking  of  the  death  of  Christ  as  "  atonement,"  "  expiation," 
"■  vicarious  sacrifice,"  "■  sin-offering,"  "  substitution,"  "  satis- 
faction," yet  they  connect  with  these  words  very  different 
ideas.  Such  is  the  testimony  of  an  eminent  Orthodox  divine, 
who  speaks  thus  :  — 

"  There  is  a  general  concurrence  in  the  words  vicarious, 
expiation,  ojfering,  substitute,  and  the  like,  but  no  agreement 
as  to  the  manner  in  which  they  arc  to  get  their  meaning. 
Sometimes  the  analogy  of  criminal  law  is  taken  ;  and  then 
our  sins  are  spoken  of  as  being  transferred  to  Christ,  or  he 
as  having  accepted  them  to  bear  their  penalty.     Sometimes 


236      ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

the  civil  or  commercial  law  furnishes  the  analogy ;  and  then, 
our  sins  being  taken  as  a  debt,  Christ  offers  himself  as  a  ran- 
som for  us.  Or  the  analogy  of  the  ceremonial  law  is  accepted  ; 
and  then  Christ  is  set  forth  as  a  propitiatory  or  expiatory 
offering  to  obtain  remission  of  sins  for  us.  Regarding  Christ 
as  suffering  for  us  in  one  or  another  of  these  Scripture  forms 
or  figures  taken  as  the  literal  dogmatic  truth,  we  have  as 
many  distinct  theories.  Then,  again,  different  as  these 
figures  are  from  each  other,  they  will  yet  be  used  inter- 
changeably, all  in  the  sense  of  one  or  another  of  them.  And 
then,  again,  to  double  the  confusion  yet  once  more,  we  have 
two  sets  of  representations  produced  under  each,  accordingly 
as  Christ  is  conceived  to  offer  himself  to  Jehovah's  justice, 
or  as  Jehovah  is  conceived  himself  to  prepare  the  offering 
out  of  his  own  mercy. 

"  On  the  whole,  I  know  of  no  definite  and  fixed  point  on 
which  the  Orthodox  view,  so  called,  may  be  said  to  hang, 
unless  it  be  this,  viz.,  that  Christ  suffers  evil  as  evil,  or  in 
direct  and  simple  substitution  for  evil  that  was  to  be  suffered 
by  us ;  so  that  God  accepts  one  evil  in  place  of  the  other, 
and,  being  satisfied  in  this  manner,  is  able  to  justify  or 
pardon. 

"  As  to  the  measure  of  this  evil,  there  are  different  opin- 
ions. Calvin  maintained  the  truly  horrible  doctrine,  that 
Christ  descended  into  hell  when  crucified,  and  suffei-ed  the 
pains  of  the  damned  for  three  days.  A  very  great  number 
of  the  Christian  teachers,  even  at  this  day,  maintain  that 
Christ  suffered  exactly  as  much  pain  as  all  the  redeemed 
would  have  suffered  under  the  penalties  of  eternal  justice. 
But  this  penal  view  of  Christ's  death  has  been  gradually 
giving  Avay,  till  now,  under  its  most  modern,  most  mitigated, 
and  least  objectionable  form,  he  is  only  said  to  have  suf- 
fered under  a  law  of  expression. 

"  Thus  God  would  have  expressed  a  certain  abhorrence  of 
sin  by  the  punishment  of  the  world.     Christ  now  suffers  only 


ORTHODOX  IDEA  OF  THE  ATONEMENT.      237 

as  much  pain  as  will  express  the  same  amount  of  abhorrence. 
And  considering  tlie  dignity  of  the  Sufferer,  and  his  relations 
to  the  Father,  there  was  no  need  of  suffering  the  same,  or 
even  any  proximate  amount  of  pain,  to  make  an  expression 
of  abhorrence  to  sin,  that  is,  of  jirstice,  equal  to  that  pro- 
duced by  the  literal  punishment  of  the  race.  Still,  it  will  be 
seen  to  be  a  part  of  this  more  mitigated  view,  that  Christ 
suffers  evil  as  evil ;  wliich  evil  suffered  is  accepted  as  a  com- 
pensative expression  of  God's  indignation  against  sin.  Ac- 
cordingly, in  the  agony  of  Gethsemane,  and  when  the  Saviour 
exclaims  in  his  passion,  '  My  God,  my  God,  why  hast  thou 
forsaken  me?'  it  will  be  taken  for  literal  truth,  that  the 
frown  of  God,  or  divine  justice,  rested  on  his  soul. 

"  It  will  probably  be  right,  then,  to  distribute  the  views 
of  those  who  are  accepted  now  as  Orthodox  teachers,  into 
two  classes  —  one  who  consider  the  death  of  Christ  as  avail- 
ing by  what  it  is;  the  other,  by  force  of  what  it  expresses ; 
the  former  holding  it  as  a  literal  substitution  of  evil  endured 
for  evil  that  was  to  be  endured  ;  the  latter  holding  it  as  an 
expression  of  abhorrence  to  sin,  made,  through  the  suffering 
of  one,  in  place  of  the  same  expression  that  was  to  be  made 
by  the  suffering  of  many. 

"  As  regards  the  former  class  of  representations,  we  may 
say,  comprehensively,  that  they  are  capable,  one  and  all,  of 
no  light  in  which  they  do  not  even  offend  some  right  moral 
sentiment  of  our  being.  Indeed,  they  raise  up  moral  objec- 
tions with  such  marvellous  fecundity,  that  we  can  hardly 
state  them  as  fast  as  they  occur  to  us."  * 

§  2.  Great  Importance  attributed  to  this  Doctrine.  —  But, 
notwithstanding  the  fact  that  there  is  such  confusion  in  the 
minds  of  the  Orthodox  about  this  doctrine,  there  is,  never- 
theless, no  doctrine  the  belief  in  which  is  regarded  as  so 
important.     With  respect  to  other  doctrines,  —  the  Trinity, 

*  God  in  Christ,  by  Horace  Bushnell,  p.  193,  &o. 


238    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

for  example,  —  dogmatic  Christianity  declares  our  salvation 
to  depend  upon  our  belief  of  it ;  but  in  regard  to  the  atone- 
ment, it  goes  farther,  and  makes  our  salvation  depend  on 
using  the  phraseology  of  the  doctrine.  Other  doctrines  will 
save  us,  on  the  condition  of  believing  them  ;  this,  on  the  con- 
dition of  using  the  language.  If  a  man  shall  lead  a  life  of 
purity  and  goodness-,  but  expresses  doubts  concerning  this 
doctrine,  his  Orthodox  friends  will  have  scarcely  any  hope  of 
his  salvation  ;  but  if  the  most  depraved  criminal,  after  a  life 
Steeped  in  wickedness,  shall  merely  say  on  his  death-bed, 
that  he  hopes  "  to  be  saved  by  the  atoning  blood  of  Christ," 
he  is  thought  immediately  to  be  on  the  fair  way  to  heaven. 
No  matter  how  good  a  man  is,  if  he  does  not  accept  the  Or- 
thodox language  on  this  point,  his  friends  fear  for  him  :  no 
matter  how  bad  he  is,  if  he  does  accept  it,  they  hope  for  him. 
There  is  a  sort  of  magical  power  attributed  to  the  very  words. 
They  are  almost  supposed  to  act  like  a  talisman  or  a  charm. 

Now,  while  we  reject  all  such  superstitious  views  of  the 
power  of  mere  words,  while  we  reject  all  false  meaning  and 
all  no  meaning,  it  is  proper  to  think  that  there  may  be  some 
substantial  truth  in  these  Orthodox  opinions  concerning  the 
atonement.  Let  us  endeavor  to  find  what  this  vital  truth 
really  is,  and  why  this  doctrine  is  so  dear  to  the  heart  of 
■Orthodoxy. 

§  3.  Stress  laid  on  the  Death  of  Jesus  in  the  Scripture.  — 
Consider  the  stress  laid  on  the  sufferings  of  Jesus  in  the  New 
Testament.  Notice  what  our  Saviour  says  himself:  "This 
is  my  blood  of  the  New  Covenant,  which  is  shed  for  many 
for  the  remission  of  sins."  "  The  bread  that  I  will  give  is 
my  flesh,  Avhich  I  will  give  for  the  life  of  the  world."  "For 
as  Moses  lifted  up  the  serpent  in  the  wilderness,  even  so 
must  the  Son  of  man  be  lifted  up,  that  whosoever  believeth 
in  him  should  not  perish,  but  have  eternal  life."  "  I  am  the 
good  shepherd :  the  good  shepherd  giveth  his  life  for  the 
sheep." 


ORTHODOX  IDEA  OF  THE  ATONEMENT.      239 

Consider,  again,  what  is  said  on  this  subject  in  the  Epis- 
tles. ''Jesus  Christ,  whom  God  hath  set  forth  as  a  mercy 
seat  through  faith  in  his  blood."  '•  When  we  were  enemies 
Ave  were  reconciled  to  God  by  the  death  of  his  Son."  "  He 
died  for  our  sins."  '"  He  is  sacrificed  for  us."  "  He  gave 
himself  for  our  sins."  "  We  have  redemption  through  his 
blood,  even  the  forgiveness  of  sin."  "  Having  made  peace 
through  the  blood  of  his  cross."  "  He  gave  himself  a  ran- 
som for  all."  "  He  washed  us  from  our  sins  through  his 
blood."  "  By  whose  stripes  we  ai'e  healed."  "  Though  he 
were  a  Son,  yet  learned  he  obedience  by  the  things  which  he 
suffered,  and  being  made  perfect,  became  the  author  of  eter- 
nal salvation  unto  all  them  that  obey  him."  Again  :  "  But 
we  see  Jesus,  who  was  made  a  little  lower  than  the  angels, 
for  the  suffering  of  death,  crowned  with  glory  and  honor,  that 
he,  by  the  grace  of  God,  should  taste  death  for  every  man. 
For  it  became  him,  for  whom  are  all  things,  and  by  whom 
are  all  things,  in  bringing  many  sons  unto  glory,  to  make 
the  Captain  of  their  salvation  perfect  through  sufferings." 
"  Wherefore  in  all  things  it  behooved  him.  to  be  made  like 
unto  his  brethren,  that  he  might  be  a  merciful  and  faithful 
high  priest  in  things  pertaining  to  God,  to  make  reconcilia- 
tion for  the  sins  of  the  people.  For  in  tht^t  he  iiimself  hath 
suffei'ed,  being  tempted,  he  is  able  to  suocor  them  that  are 
tempted." 

These  are  some  of  the  passages  whicli  connect  the  suffer- 
ings of  Jesus  Christ  with  sin  on  the  one  hand,  and  salvation 
on  the  other. 

§  4.  Difficulty  in  interpreting  these  Scripture  Passages.  -— 
There  is  a  difficulty,  however,  in  understanding  the  mean- 
ing and  feeling  the  force  of  such  texts  as  these.  This  diffi- 
culty consists  in  the  fact  that  these  passages  are  constantly 
quoted  as  proof  texts.  From  our  childhood  up  we  have 
heard  them  brought  forward  to  prove  the  truth  of  some 
particular  doctrine  or   theory    of  afcaement,  and  when  ^•'c> 


240         orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

read  these  verses,  we  immediately  associate  them  with  some 
doctrine  which  we  like  or  dislike.  Our  feelings  and  prej- 
udices arfe  involved  in  iuterpi'eting  the  passage  one  way 
or  the  other,  so  that  we  are  unable  to  look  at  it  fairly.  In 
order  to  overcome  this  difficulty,  we  must  make  this  obvious 
distinction.  We  must  distinguish  between  the  statement  of 
a  fact  and  the  theory  concerning  it.  The  fact  which  the 
Bible  states  is  simply  this  —  that  the  sins  of  man  were  the 
occasion  of  Christ's  death,  and  that  by  his  death  he  saves  us 
from  our  sin.  This  is  the  fact  which  the  Scriptures  assert. 
The  way  in  which  he  saves  us  is  a  matter  of  theory.  Why 
it  was  that  human  sin  made  it  necessary  for  Christ  to  die, 
how  it  is  that  his  death  reconciles  us  to  God, — this  belongs 
to  the  theory. 

Now,  while  the  Scriptures  say  a  great  deal  about  the  fact 
that  Christ's  sufferings  save  us  from  our  sins,  they  say  very 
little  as  regards  the  way  in  which  they  save  us  from  our  sins. 

§  5.  Theological  Theories  based  on  the  Figurative  Lan- 
guage of  the  Neio  Testament.  —  The  Scriptures  state  the  fact ; 
the  theologians  have  supplied  the  explanations.  Innumera- 
ble have  been  the  theories  devised  by  theology  to  show  in 
what  way  the  suiFerings  of  Christ  have  availed  for  the  sal- 
vation of  men  —  theories  of  imputation,  theories  of  substi- 
tution, theories  of  satisfaction.  He  was  punished  in  our 
place  ;  he  paid  our  debt ;  he  was  our  federal  head  and  repre- 
sentative ;  he  satisfied  the  justice  of  God ;  he  appeased  the 
wrath  of  God.  But  especially  are  the  figures  and  metaphors 
of  the  New  Testament  pressed  into  the  service  of  theology, 
and  made  the  basis  of  grave  theories.  Thus  are  metaphors 
turned  into  metaphysics,  and  rhetoric  changed  to  logic.  The 
images  of  the  New  Testament  were  natui-ally  taken  from 
familiar  objects  and  transactions,  especially  from  war,  from 
slavery,  and  from  the  Jewish  ritual.  Sin  is  our  enemy,  who 
has  conquered  us  in  battle,  and  made  us  his  prisoners. 
Christ  redeems  us  from  this  captivity,  and  pays  our  ransom. 


ORTHODOX  IDEA  OF  THE  ATONEMENT.      241 

Siu  is  a  cruel  master,  and  we  are  his  slaves.  He  is  about  to 
torture  us  with  the  rod.  Christ  comes  and  takes  our  punish- 
ment on  himself.  He  bears  our  stripes.  According  to  the 
Jewish  ritual  the  paschal  feast  was  a  commemoration  of 
God's  mercy.  It  was  to  the  Jews  what  Thanksgiving  Day 
is  to  the  people  of  New  England.  So  the  Christians  said 
Christ  is  our  Passover.  In  the  Jewish  ritual  God  was  be- 
lieved to  manifest  himself  over  the  mercy  seat  in  the  inner 
sanctuary  of  the  temple.  The  Christians  said,  Christ  is  our 
mercy  seat.  All  this  was  natural ;  but  these  images  have 
been  turned  into  elaborate  theories  by  the  theologians  who 
have  argued  that  Christ's  death  was  a  literal  ranson,  a  literal 
mercy  seat,  and  a  literal  passover. 

These  theories  have  mostly  passed  by.  The  common  Or- 
thodox theory  in  New  England  now  is  much  more  reason- 
able, but  unfortunately  much  less  scriptural.  It  is  founded 
on  the  analogy  of  human  government.  God  is  compared  to 
a  wise  and  kind  ruler,  who  governs  by  law,  and  who  wishes 
to  pardon  the  penitent  criminal,  but  fears  that  if  he  does  so, 
he  will  impair  the  respect  felt  for  his  law,  and  therefore 
thinks  it  necessary  to  do  something  to  show  the  evil  of  dis- 
obedience before  he  can  pardon.  Christ  is  willing  to  die  in 
order  to  make  this  impression  on  the  minds  of  men.  And 
this  he  accordingly  does.  But  unfortunately,  as  we  said, 
there  is  nothing  in  the  Scripture,  not  even  a  metaphorical 
expression,  to  support  this  theory.  The  apostles  did  not 
have  recourse  for  their  figures  and  images  to  such  usage  of 
government,  and  that  for  the  simple  reason  that  no  such 
uaage  or  necessity  then  existed.  The  governments  were  all 
despotic,  and  no  despot,  wishing  to  pardon,  had  any  ditliculty 
on  the  ground  that  the  sanctity  of  his  laws  might  be  impaired. 

War,  slavery,  and  the  Jewish  ritual,  and  household  usages 

existed.     Their  images  were  taken  from  these.     They  spoke 

of  ransom,  of  stripes,  of  the  passover,  and  the  mercy  seat, 

of  washing  and  healing,  but  not  of  governments  and  laws. 

21 


242    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

Sin  is  our  conqueror,  and  Christ  redeems  us.  Sin  is  a 
slavery,  and  Christ  ransoms  us.  Sin  is  defilement,  and 
Christ  washes  us.  Sin  is  a  disease,  and  Christ  heals  us. 
All  this  occurs  again  and  again,  but  nothing  occurs  about 
constitutional  governments,  or  conflicts  between  the  claims 
of  justice  and  mercy. 

§  6.  The  three  •principal  Views  of  the  Atonement  —  tear- 
like^  legal,  and  governmental.  —  Three  principal  views  on 
this  subject  have  prevailed  in  the  Christian  Church  as  Or- 
thodox. The  first  may  be  called  the  warlike  view  of  Christ's 
work,  the  second  may  be  called  the  legal  view,  and  the  third 
the  governmental  view.  The  first  was  the  prevailing  Ortho- 
dox view  from  the  earliest  times  till  the  middle  ages,  and  is 
based  on  the  idea  of  a  conflict  or  war  between  Christ  and 
the  Devil  for  the  soul  of  man.  The  Devil  had  gained  pos- 
session of  the  human  race  in  consequence  of  its  sin.  The 
right  of  the  Devil  over  men  was  fully  admitted.  Augustine 
considered  it  as  the  right  of  property,  Leo  the  Great  as  the 
right  of  a  conqueror.  Christ  gave  his  own  life  to  the  Devil 
as  a  ransom,  which  was  adequate  to  redeem  the  whole  race. 
This  theory  rested  on  the  literal  interpretation  of  the  words 
"  ransom  "  and  "  redemption."  If  Christ's  death  was  a  ran- 
som, if  he  came  "  to  give  his  life  a  ransom  for  many,"  the 
question  naturally  arose,  '•'■From  whose  power  were  men  re- 
deemed, and  to  whom  was  the  ransom  paid  ?  "  Certainly, 
men  were  not  redeemed  from  the  power  of  God.  The  ran- 
som could  not  have  been  paid  to  God,  but  to  some  enemy 
who  held  us  as  his  prisoners.  The  only  possible  answer, 
therefore,  is,  that  the  ransom  was  paid  to  the  Devil.  The 
Devil  was  the  cruel  tyrant  who  had  enslaved  us.  He  had  a 
right  to  do  so  ;  for  we  had  become  his  slaves  through  our 
sin.  But  he  had  no  right  over  Christ,  for  Christ  had  com- 
mitted no  sin  ;  so  that  the  death  of  Christ  was  a  free  ofi^ering 
to  the  Devil  to  redeem  the  race.  According  to  this  view, 
therefore,  the  atonement  was  made  to  the  Devil. 


ORTHODOX  IDEA  OP  THE  ATONEMENT.      243 

But  in  the  middle  ages  another  view  of  the  atonement 
became  Orthodox,  founded  not  upon  tlie  idea  of  a  ransom, 
but  on  that  of  a  debt.  According  to  this  view  the  divine 
law  requires  that  the  debt  which  man  owes  to  God,  which 
is  perfect  obedience,  shall  be  paid,  either  by  himself  or  by 
some  one  else.  Anselm,  the  founder  of  this  theory,  defined 
sin  "  as  not  giving  to  God  his  due."  Man  cannot  pay  this 
debt  himself,  and  therefore  Christ  pays  it  for  him.  This  is 
the  legal  view  of  the  atonement,  or  perhaps  we  might  rather 
call  it  the  commercial  view. 

But  this  theory,  after  having  endured  as  Orthodox  for 
some  five  hundred  years,  gave  place  to  a  third,  based  not  on 
the  idea  of  a  I'ansom  or  of  a  debt,  but  of  a  state  necessity.  It 
would  not  do  for  God,  as  a  moral  Governor,  to  forgive  sin, 
unless  by  some  great  example  an  impression  could  be  made 
of  the  evil  of  sin.  This  impression  is  produced  by  the  death 
of  Christ,  who  therefore  died  not  to  atone  for  past  sin,  but 
to  prevent  future  sin,  or,  in  other  words,  to  make  a  moral 
impression  on  the  human  mind.  This  is  the  popular  theory 
of  the  atonement  held  by  the  Orthodox  at  the  present  time. 
But  it  is  very  much  mixed  up  with  the  others.  The  differ- 
ent views  held  by  modern  Orthodoxy  range  all  the  way  from 
the  old  Calvinism  of  Princeton,  through  the  various  shades 
of  New  England  theology,  to  the  latest  form  expressed  by 
Dr.  Horace  Bushnell  in  his  recent  work  on  "  Vicarious 
Sacrifice." 

§  7.  Impression  made  by  Chrisi's  Death  on  the  Minds  of 
his  Disciples.  First  Theory  on  the  Subject  in  the  Epistle  to 
the  Hebrews.  —  The  sufferings  of  Jesus  produced  a  wonder- 
ful impression  on  the  minds  of  his  disciples.  This  impres- 
sion was  compounded  of  astonishment,  tenderness,  and  grati- 
tude. That  a  man  so  divine  in  character,  in  wisdom,  in  a 
command  over  nature,  should  submit  willingly  to  such  labor, 
ignominy,  and  anguish,  was  a  wonder  to  them.  But  there 
was  a  mystery  of  sorrow  beneath  the  visible  sorrow,  a  pain 


244    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

within  the  pain,  a  depth  of  grief  felt  not  for  himself,  but  for 
others,  an  anguish  on  account  of  the  sin  of  the  Avorld,  which 
especially  awed  and  touched  them.  Christ  plunged  into  the 
midst  of  sin  to  save  souls,  as  a  hero  rushes  into  the  midst 
of  burning  flames  to  save  lives.  No  man  like  Jesus  had 
ever  felt  such  anguish  and  horror  at  the  sight  of  sin ;  but. 
instead  of  flying  from  it,  he  came  into  the  midst  of  it  to  save 
the  sinner.  This  was  the  secret  of  his  agony,  the  bitterness 
of  his  cup.  Martyrs  at  the  stake  are  borne  up  by  their  own 
triumphant  self-approval.  But  Jesus,  in  his  anguish,  did  not 
think  of  his  own  triumph,  but  the  sin  and  sorrow  of  those 
who  afflicted  him.  "Daughters  of  Jerusalem,  weep  not  for 
me,  but  Aveep  for  yourselves  and  your  children."  "  Father, 
forgive  them ;  they  know  not  what  they  do."  This  is  the 
secret  of  Christ's  anguish  —  this  infinite  horror  of  sin  joined 
to  an  infinite  love  for  the  sinner. 

Through  this  depth  of  sorrow  there  came  to  the  minds  of 
the  apostles  a  revelation  of  the  evil  of  sin  and  the  infinite 
compassion  of  God,  which  produced  penitence,  hope,  and 
love.  The  dying  Christ  reconciled  them  to  God.  This  they 
felt  and  declared  ;  they  did  not  attempt  to  explain  how,  but 
by  images  and  metaphors  drawn  from  all  familiar  objects, 
they  declared  that  Christ's  sorrows  more  than  his  glory,  his 
patience  rather  than  his  power,  his  death  more  than  his  life, 
had  withdrawn  their  hearts  from  sin,  and  given  them  peace 
with  God. 

One  writer  alone  in  the  New  Testament  attempts  an  ex- 
planation of  this  influence.  It  is  only  an  attempt,  a  mere 
hint,  the  germ  of  a  theology :  it  is  found  in  the  Epistle  to 
the  Hebrews.* 

According  to  these  passages  Christ  suffered, —  1.  To 
Jearn  obedience ;  2.  That  he  might  thus  become  perfect ; 
3.  By  an  entire  cultivation  of  his  sympathies  with  the 
tempted  ;  4.  So  as  to  become  to  them  the  author  of  eternal 
salvation  by  reconciling  them  to  God. 

*  Heb.  2:  9,  17,  18.    4:  16.    5:  8,9. 


ORTHODOX  IDEA  OP  THE  ATONEMENT.      215 

This,  we  may  observe,  so  far  as  it  goes,  is  really  a  theory 
of  atonement,  and  not  a  mere  statement  of  the  fact.  More- 
over, it  seems  to  us  to  contain  the  germ  of  a  far  nobler  and 
deeper  theory  than  any  in  which  the  Church  has  hitherto 
believed.  It  is  more  human,  more  rational,  connected  more 
with  real  experience  and  the  solid  facts  of  life. 

§  8.  Value  of  Suffering  as  a  Means  of  Education.  —  The 
sufferings  of  Christ  were  necessary  for  his  own  perfection, 
and  suffering  in  some  form  or  other  is  necessary  for  all  per- 
fection. It  is  often  said  that  suffering  in  this  world  is  casual, 
an  accidental  thing,  arising  from  human  mistakes,  and  that 
the  time  will  come  in  which  man  will  grow  up  into  perfec- 
tion without  suffering.  A  perpetual  sunlight  is  thought  to 
be  the  best  condition  for  the  human  plant.  Pain  and  want 
stunt  its  growth,  winter  storms  arrest  its  development ;  and 
so  it  is  supposed  that  if  we  can  get  rid  of  this  element  of 
suffering,  human  beings  will  soon  become  all  they  ought  to 
be.     But  the  poet  speaks  more  wisely  who  says,  — 

'•  To  each  their  suffering's  :  all  are  men 
Condemned  alike  to  groan; 
The  feeling:  for  another's  woes, 
The  unfeeling  for  his  own." 

For  suppose  that  we  could  remove  from  the  world  all 
outward  evil  —  get  rid  of  sickness,  pain,  poverty,  death. 
Would  not  the  worst  part  of  evil  still  remain  ?  Would  not 
discontent,  selfishness,  envy,  wilfulness,  cruelty,  self-indul- 
gence continue  ?  All  these  exist  —  perhaps  exist  most  fre- 
quently —  where  there  is  the  least  of  outward  evil ;  and  the 
outward  evil  is  the  bitter  medicine  which  comes  by  and  by 
as  a  cure. 

§  9.  The  Human  Conscience  suggests  the  Need  of  some 
Satisfaction  in  order  to  our  Forgiveness.  —  The  central  idea 
of  the  atonement  is,  that  Christ  has  done  something  which 
enables  God  to  forgive  us  our  sin  ;  and  the  reason  why  this 
doctrine  of  atonement  seems  so  precious  is,  that  we  feel  that 
21* 


246     ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

there  is  a  real  difficulty  in  the  way  of  forgiveness,  —  as  if 
something  else  were  necessary  besides  repentance,  —  as  if 
some  compensation  or  reparation  should  be  made  somehow 
to  the  offended  law  of  God,  or  to  the  aggrieved  holiness  of 
God.  We  do  not  say  that  this  feeling  is  a  true  feeling :  that 
question  we  must  consider  afterwards.  But  it  is,  at  any  rate, 
a  natural  feeling,  whether  it  be  founded  on  our  knowledge 
of  God  or  our  ignorance  of  God.  It  is  hard  to  believe  that 
a  man  whom  we  have  injured  will  forgive  us  that  injury 
merely  because  we  ask  him  to  do  so,  and  are  sorry  for  Avhat 
we  have  done.  We  feel  that  we  must  make  some  reparation 
before  he  can  or  ought  to  forgive  us.  Unquestionably,  the 
conscience  is  the  source  of  this  feeling.  It  led  Zaccheus  to 
say,  "  If  I  have  done  any  man  wrong,  I  restore  him  four- 
fold." A  full  repai-ation  for  an  injury,  accompanied  with 
sorrow  for  having  done  it,  the  expression  of  which  sorrow  is 
confession,  satisfies  the  conscience.  Having  done  this,  we 
feel  that  we  have  a  right  to  be  forgiven. 

But  it  is  very  seldom  that  such  full  reparation  can  be 
made.  The  consequences  of  our  wrong  acts  cannot  usually 
be  removed  or  effaced.  Wrong-doing  is  like  the  gate  of 
hell  —  easy  to  open,  but  difficult,  if  not  impossible,  to  close 
again.  "  She  opened,  but  to  shut  excelled  her  power."  In- 
stead of  reparation,  therefore,  the  conscience  substitutes 
retribution  —  either  reparation  or  the  penalty ;  and  the 
natural  form  of  the  penalty  is  an  equivalent.  Natural  jus- 
tice says,  "  An  eye  for  an  eye,  a  tooth  for  a  tooth."  This 
the  conscience  thinks  right ;  this  is  justice.  All  less  than 
this  is  mercy  ;  all  more  than  this  is  revenge. 

We  think  that  if  we  analyze  the  feeling  which  the  con- 
science gives  us  concerning  the  consequences  of  wrong-doing, 
it  is  this  :  First,  conscience  demands  reparation  to  the  injured 
party  ;  second,  it  demands  punishment  as  a  satisfaction  to  be 
made  to  the  law  of  right,  and  this  suffering  to  be  accepted  as 
just  by  the  guilty  party :  and  thirdly,  it  declares  that  guilt 


ORTHODOX    IDEA    OK   THE    ATONEMENT.  247 

should  produce  au  alieuatiou  or  separation  between  the  guilty 
party  and  those  who  are  not  guilty. 

To  illustrate  all  this,  let  us  suppose  a  case.  A  man,  hith- 
erto respected  and  trusted  by  society  commits  some  great 
breach  of  trust,  and  robs  the  community.  What  does  the 
conscience  in  such  a  case  demand?  First,  that  he  should 
give  up  his  property,  and  make,  if  he  can,  full  restitution  ; 
second,  that  he  should  endure  some  suffering  —  that  he  should 
not  continue  to  enjoy,  as  before,  all  his  accustomed  privi- 
leges ;  and  third,  that  he  should  not  retain  his  standing  in 
society,  and  receive,  as  before,  the  countenance  and  esteem 
of  honorable  persons.  Conscience  requires  that  he  should 
make  atonement  to  those  he  has  injured  by  restitution ;  to 
the  law  of  right,  which  he  has  offended,  by  suffering  some 
punishment ;  and  to  honorable  men  by  keeping  out  of  their 
way. 

This,  which  the  conscience  teaches  of  an  injury  done  to 
man,  it  also  teaches  of  au  injury  done  to  God.  The  offence 
against  man  is  a  crime ;  the  offence  against  God  is  a  sin. 
For  a  crime,  the  conscience  requires  restitution,  punishment 
with  confession,  and  alienation  fi-om*  the  good,  which  is 
shame.  For  a  sin,  the  conscience  requires,  in  like  manner, 
restitution,  punishment,  and  alienation.  It  merely  transfers 
to  God's  justice  the  ideas  of  atonement  which  human  justice 
has  given  to  it. 

But  God's  justice  is  not  like  man's.  The  ideas  of  atone- 
ment so  abstracted  are  essentially  false ;  and  to  convince  us 
of  their  falsehood  is  one  of  the  objects  of  Christ's  death.  It 
is  to  show  us  that  God  does  not  demand  this  full  restitution, 
does  not  intend  to  inflict  this  punishment,  and  is  not  alien- 
ated from  the  penitent  sinner.  The  death  of  Christ  has 
done  this. 

§  10.  How  the  Death  of  Jesus  brings  Men  to  God.  —  As  a 
matter  of  fact,  the  death  of  Christ  has  enabled  men  to  come 
to  God.    "  They  who  were  afar  off  are  made  nigh  by  the  blood 


248    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

of  Christ."  As  a  matter  of  fact,  it  has  lifted  men  above  the 
fear  of  God  into  the  love  of  God.  And  this  must  be  a 
divine  work.  Not  the  mere  death  of  the  human  being  could 
have  done  this  ;  but  the  God  who  dwelt  in  him  has  uttered 
his  tender  love,  his  forgiving  grace,  from  the  cross.  "  God 
was  in  Christ,  reconciling  the  world  unto  himself."  The 
death  of  Christ  is  an  expression  of  God's  free  grace.  If  we 
regard  Christ,  in  his  life  and  character,  as  a  manifestation 
of  God's  Avill,  then  his  pathetic  and  tender  death  reveals  to 
us  that  God  loves  us  even  when  we  are  sinners,  before 
reparation  or  repentance ;  "  for,  while  we  were  sinners, 
Christ  died  for  us." 

There  is,  however,  a  difficulty  in  believing  that  we  can  be 
forgiven.     This  difficulty  is  in  the  conscience  ;  and,  — 

(a.)    To  say  there  is  no  difficulty,  will  not  remove  it. 

(6.)  To  say  that  repentance  and  good  works  are  enough, 
will  not  remove  it. 

(c.)  To  say  that  God  is  merciful,  will  not  remove  it ;  for 
the  difficulty  lies  in  the  conscience,  which  declares  that  every 
sin  is, — 

1.  An  injury  don e^ to  God. 

2.  An  injury  to  the  moral  universe  ;  inasmuch  as  it  is 
an  example  of  evil,  and  a  defiance  of  right. 

'3.  An  injury  to  ourselves,  by  putting  us  away  from  God, 
the  source  of  life,  and  alienating  us  from  him. 

Now,  it  is  true  that  the  New  Testament  says,  "  Repent, 
and  be  converted,  and  your  sins  shall  be  blotted  out ; " 
"  Believe,  and  be  saved."  It  is  true  that  if  we  will  believe 
ourselves  forgiven,  we  shall  be  forgiven.  But  how  can  we 
believe  it,  when  the  inward  voice  of  conscience  is  always 
saying  that  God  ought  not  to  forgive  us  without  some  repa- 
ration made  for  the  injury  done  to  himself,  to  ihe  universe, 
and  to  ourselves? 

We  need  something  to  believe  in  —  some  manifestation, 
some  object.     Something  we  need  done  by  God  to  assure  us 


ORTHODOX  IDEA  OF  THE  ATONEMENT.      249 

that  he  is  in  earnest  in  desiring  us  to  come  and  be  reconciled 
to  him. 

Now,  the  sufferings  and  death  of  Christ  seem  to  be  this 
object :  they  enable  us  to  believe  in  forgiveness,  and  so  to  be 
forgiven  ;  they  meet  the  difficulty  of  the  conscience,  and  re- 
lieve it  of  its  threefold  embarrassment.  For,  in  regard  to 
the  injury  done  to  God,  Christ's  sufferings  are  substitution, 
or  vicarious  suffering.  I  do  not  say  vicarious  punishment. 
The  innocent  cannot  be  punished  in  the  place  of  the  guilty  ; 
but  he  can  suffer,  and  constantly  does  suffer,  in  the  place 
of  the  guilty.  These  two  laws  are  announced  in  the  Old 
Testament :  "  The  soul  that  sinneth,  it  shall  die  ; "  "  The 
wickedness  of  parents  shall  be  on  the  children."  If  a  man 
is  alone,  he  must  bear  all  the  consequences  of  his  sins ;  but 
if  he  have  friends  and  children,  they  will  relieve  him  of 
some  by  their  self-sacrificing  kindness :  their  snfferings  take 
the  place  of  his  punishment.  How  often  a  wife  does  this  ! 
■ —  interposing  her  sufferings  between  her  husband's  sins  and 
their  penalty.  And  Avhata  profound  impression  is  made  by 
it  of  the  evil  of  sin  !  It  torments  innocent  women  and  cliil- 
dren  ;  it  shipwrecks  the  peace  of  a  family.  What  an  effect 
is  produced  on  the  man  himself!  What  a  reproach  and 
tender  rebuke  to  him  is  this  !  The  sufferings  of  Christ  are 
substituted  in  this  way  for  ours,  according  to  this  law ;  and 
this  divine  substitution  is  continued  in  the  sacrifices  of  Chris- 
tians. Missionaries  and  martyrs,  by  their  zeal,  patience, 
and  generosity,  carry  out  the  sacrifice  of  Christ.  This  is 
God  in  Christ  working  in  us  and  in  the  Church,  and  working 
for  sinners. 

Then,  as  to  the  injury  to  the  world  by  the  contempt  sin 
does  to  the  law,  the  sufferings  of  Christ  are  satisfaction : 
they  satisfy  the  divine  law  ;  they  make  an  impression  of  the 
importance  of  the  law.  But  here,  again,  it  is  not  merely 
Christ  alone  who  does  it,  but  God  in  Christ,  and  Christ  in 
the  Church,  who  honor  the  divine  law  by  the  respect  pro- 


250  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

duced  for  it.  They  bring  us  to  repentance  ;  they  make  us 
feel  the  sinfulness  of  sin  ;  show  us  the  misery  it  causes  to 
those  who  love  us,  —  how  it  pains  God,  pains  Christ,  pains 
the  good,  and  pains  our  friends.  So  we  feel  it,  and  show  it 
by  true  penitence,  and  so  honor  the  law.  The  law  is  satis- 
fied  when  the  sufferings  of  Christ  and  his  followers,  caused 
by  sin,  lead  men  to  abhor  sin,  and  love  righteousness. 

As  to  the  injury  which  sin  does  to  a  man  himself  by  sepa- 
rating him  from  God's  love,  and  making  him  at  enmity  with 
God,  and  God's  wrath  on  him,  the  sufferings  of  Christ  are 
reconciliation.  "  God  was  in  Christ,  reconciling  the  world 
to  himself."  Why  was  God  alienated  from  man  ?  Because 
he  is  holy.  How  can  an  unholy  person  be  at  one  with  a 
holy  God?  The  answer  is  this:  God  comes  into  his  heart 
by  Christ,  to  form  Christ  within  him,  and  to  make  him  holy 
as  Christ  was  holy.  He  sees  that  when  united  with  Christ 
his  sinfulness  is  killed  in  its  roots,  and  a  seed  of  perfect 
purity  is  planted  in  his  soul ;  and  so  God  is  able  to  be  at  one 
with  him  through  his  union  with  Christ :  "  I  in  them,  and 
thou  in  me,  that  we  may  be  perfectly  at  one."  A  love  for 
Christ  in  the  heart  forms  Christ  within  us.  He  is  our  life, 
our  motive  power,  our  aim  ;  and  so  he  casts  out  the  root  of 
our  sin,  and  brings  us  to  God. 

-  Thus  we  see  that,  even  though  we  should  reject  all  the 
Orthodox  theories  about  atonement,  we  may  accept  the  fact. 
"We  can  believe  that  God  in  Christ  does  reconcile  the  world 
to  himself,  —  does  create  a  sense  of  pardoned  sin,  —  does 
remove  the  weight  of  transgression,  —  does  take  away  the 
obstacle  in  our  conscience,  —  does  help  us  into  a  living  faith, 
hope,  peace,  and  joy. 

Moreover,  Christ  is  really  a  sacrifice  for  sin  —  a  real  and 
true  sin-offering.  For  what  were  the  sin-offerings  under  the 
law?  How  did  they  remove  sin?  Not  by  themselves  (it 
was  impossible  for  the  blood  of  bulls  and  goats  to  remove 
sin),  but  because  they  were  an  appointment  of  God,  and  so 


ORTHODOX  IDEA  OF  THE  ATONEMENT.      251 

showed  God's  disposition.  They  showed  that  his  holiness 
was  displeased  with  evil  ;  tliey  showed  that  he  loved  the  sia- 
uer,  and  wisliod  to  make  him  holy.  So  the  death  of  Christ 
is  a  true  sacrifice  in  exactly  the  same  way,  but  in  a  higher 
degree,  convincing  us  of  the  evil  of  sin  and  the  love  of  God. 

The  experience  of  the  whole  Church  teaches  the  power  of 
tliis  faith  to  create  in  our  souls  a  new  life  of  love.  Seeing 
God  coming  to  us  in  Christ  to  reconcile  us  to  himself,  and 
freely  forgiving  our  sins,  removes  from  our  hearts  doubt, 
anxiety,  and  the  burden  of  hard  responsibility,  and  fills  the 
soul  with  a  deep  peace  and  joy  in  believing.  So  felt  the 
apostle  Peter  when  the  Master  forgave  him  his  denial.  From 
the  fountain  of  that  forgiveness  flowed  forth  a  river  of  devo- 
tion. So  felt  Paul  when  forgiven  by  Jesus  ;  so  felt  Augus- 
tine, so  Ambrose,  so  Luther,  so  Wesley  :  because  they  had 
been  forgiven  much,  they  loved  much  ;  for  to  whom  little  is 
forgiven,  the  same  loveth  little. 

The  practical  conclusion  is,  that  it  is  less  important  to 
speculate  as  to  the  how,  than  to  endeavor  to  see  the  fact.  What 
we  need  is  faith  in  God's  pardoning,  redeeming,  saving  love 
in  Christ  Jesus  —  faith  that  our  sins  are  blotted  out ;  that 
we  can  come  at  once  to  our  Father  ;  that  we  can  come  bold- 
ly to  the  throne  of  grace  ;  that  the  infinite  Father  looks  at  us 
with  love  when  we  are  a  great  way  off,  and  says,  "  This  my 
sou  was  dead,  and  is  alive  again  ;  was  lost,  and  is  found." 

We  may  therefore,  when  we  are  conscious  of  going  wrong 
and  of  doing  wrong,  instead  of  trying  to  reform  ourselves 
alone  by  our  own  strength,  go  first  to  God,  and  be  forgiven 
through  faith  in  the  great  sacrifice  of  Christ :  "  Whom  God 
hath  set  forth  to  be  a  propitiation  (or  mercy  seat),  through 
faith  in  his  blood,  to  declare  his  righteousness  for  the  remis- 
sion of  sins  that  are  past,  through  the  forbearance  of  God, 
that  he  might  be  just,  and  the  justifier  of  him  which  believ- 
eth  in  Jesus." 

§11.    This  Law  of  Vicarious  Suffering  universal.  —  Or- 


252  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

thodoxy,  in  all  its  theories  concerning  the  influence  of  the 
death  of  Jesus,  has  supposed  his  case  exceptional  and  his 
work  peculiar.  It  would  be  very  shocking  to  most  Ortho- 
dox minds  to  suppose  that  the  same  law  of  vicarious  sacri- 
fice applies  to  others  ;  that  the  sufferings  and  death  of  the 
good,  in  all  ages,  have  helped  to  atone  for  evil ;  have  enabled 
sinners  to  obtain  pardon.     But  such,  we  believe,  is  the  fact. 

Jesus  Chi'ist  came,  providentially,  as  the  typical  and  per- 
fect man  —  the  one  who  was  sent  by  God,  in  his  providence, 
to  illustrate  what  humanity  is  to  be  and  to  do.  If  this 
is  so,  then  Christ  did  essentially  nothing  but  that  which  is 
finally  to  be  done  by  all^  in  some  degree,  or  some  way.  He 
is  a  channel,  a  mediator,  through  whom  God's  life  flows  into 
ours  ;  but  then  he  makes  us  also  mediators,  by  whom  his  life 
shall  flow  to  others.  He  is  the  image  of  God  ;  but  every  true 
Christian  is,  again,  the  image  of  Christ.  For  what  Christ  did, 
and  was,  was  no  afterthought,  no  exception,  but  a  part  of  the 
plan  of  the  universe.  He  was  "  foreordained  before  the  foun- 
dation of  the  world,  but  manifest  in  these  last  times."  He  was 
the  "  Lamb  of  God,  slaiu  from  the  foundation  of  the  world." 
That  is,  his  coming,  his  character,  his  death,  his  resurrec- 
tion, his  miracles,  were  all  a  part  of  a  divine  law.  And 
all  God's  laws  are  the  same  "yesterday,  to-day,  and  for- 
ever." 

If  this  were  not  so,  we  could  not  understand  Christ,  nor 
sympathize  with  him.  His  life  would  be,  not  only  super- 
natural, which  it  is,  but  unnatural,  which  it  is  not.  His 
miracles  would  be,  not  what  they  truly  are,  —  God's  higher 
life  flowing  into  nature,  and  the  Spirit  overcoming  the  ma- 
terial resistance  of  things,  —  but  they  would  be  magical ;  they 
would  be  like  sorcery  and  enchantment  —  violations  of  the 
course  of  events. 

All  of  Christ's  life,  then,  is  typical  of  our  future  lives,  in 
this  world  or  in  some  other  world.  It  would  be  easy  to 
prove  this  out  of  Scripture.     Everything  asserted  of  Christ 


ORTHODOX  IDEA  OF  THE  ATONEMENT.      253 

is,  somewhere  and  in  some  Avay,  asserted  also  of  his  disciples, 
aud  of  all  Christians.  Is  he  said  to  be  one  with  God?  "  I 
and  my  Father  are  one."  They  also  are  said  to  be  one  with 
God :  "  That  they  all  may  be  one,  as  we  are  one ;  I  in 
tliem,  and  thou  in  me.  As  tliou,  Father,  art  in  me,  and  I 
in  thee,  that  they  also  may  be  one  in  us." 

"Was  Christ  said  to  know  all  things  ?  It  is  also  said  of  his 
disciples,  "  Ye  have  an  unction  from  the  Holy  Ghost,  and 
know  all  things." 

Did  Christ  work  miracles?  He  says  to  his  disciples, 
"Greater  works  than  these  shall  ye  do?" 

Did  God  give  to  Christ  glory  which  he  had  before  the 
world  was?  He  himself  says  of  his  disciples,  "The  glory 
thou  gavest  me  I  have  given  them." 

Did  Christ  rise  from  the  dead  into  a  higher  life?  We 
shall  do  the  same.  "  As  we  have  borne  the  image  of  the 
earthy,  we  shall  also  bear  the  image  of  the  heavenly." 

Christ,  in  his  high  and  perfect  life,  may  be  regarded 
as  a  prophecy  of  what  man  is  to  become :  we  may  look  on 
him  as  a  revelation  of  the  higher  laws  of  human  nature,  as 
a  type  of  all  humanity. 

As  regards  his  atoning  death,  his  reconciling  sufferings, 
the  same  thing  is  true.  As  he  died  for  man,  so  must  we 
die  for  each  other.  Thus  says  the  apostle  John :  "  Herein 
is  love  ;  not  that  we  loved  God,  but  that  he  loved  us,  and 
sent  his  Son  to  be  the  propitiation  for  our  sins.  Beloved, 
if  God  so  loved  us,  Ave  ought  also  to  love  one  another." 
Aud  again,  "  Because  he  laid  down  his  life  for  us,  we  ought 
also  to  lay  down  our  lives  for  the  brethren." 

And  Paul,  after  having  spoken  of  "  Christ's  having  made 
peace  by  the  blood  of  the  cross,"  says  of  himself  that  he  re- 
joices in  his  ow-n  sufferings  for  their  sake  —  rejoices  to  "fill 
up  that  which  is  behind  of  the  afflictions  of  Christ ;  "  that  is, 
make  up  any  deficiency  in  Christ's  sufferings  for  them. 
*'  Christ's  sufferings,"  he  says  elsewhere,  "  abound  in  us," 
22 


254     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

his  disciples.  "We  are  partakers  of  his  sufferings,"  says 
the  apostle  Peter.  If  he  thought  Christ's  sufferings  entirely- 
different  in  their  nature  and  meaning  from  all  other  suffer- 
ings, he  would  scarcely  have  said  that  he  "  partook  "  of  them. 

§  12.  This  Law  illustrated  from  History  —  in  the  Death  of 
Socrates^  Joan  of  Arc,  Savonarola,  and  Abraham  Lincoln,  — 
The  death  of  Jesus,  therefore,  manifested  in  a  higher  degiee 
the  same  law  which  is  illustrated  in  the  deaths  of  all  good 
and  great  souls,  martyrs  to  a  principle,  or  to  an  idea.  In 
proportion  to  the  greatness  and  universality  of  the  idea,  and 
the  greatness  and  holiness  of  the  martyr,  is  the  impression 
profound.  We  will  give  a  few  instances  of  this  from  history, 
to  see  that  the  death  of  Jesus  was  not  something  wholly  out- 
side of  law,  wholly  exceptional,  but  the  highest  example  of 
the  great  effect  produced  by  one  who  walks  straight  into 
death  for  a  great  idea. 

The  first  instance  we  take  shall  be  that  of  Socrates.  When 
we  think  of  Socrates,  we  think  of  his  death.  He,  like  Jesus, 
spent  the  time  before  his  death  conversing  with  his  friends 
concerning  the  highest  themes.  He  talked  of  immortality 
through  the  long  summer  day.  He  showed  the  superiority 
of  the  soul  to  the  body  in  which  it  dwelt ;  and  he  had  lost  all 
fear  of  dying.  He  had  silenced  what  Plato  calls  "  the  child 
tvithin  us,  who  trembles  before  death."  la  fact,  the  whole 
tone  of  his  defence  before  the  judges  shows  that  he  did  not 
care  to  save  his  life.  The  verdict  of  guilty  was  pronounced 
by  a  majority  of  five  or  six,  in  a  vote  of  five  hundred  and 
fifty-seven  dicasts.  He  made  no  preparation  for  his  defence, 
and  said  that  a  blameless  life  was  the  best  defence.  When 
lie  came  to  speak  before  those  whose  vote  was  to  decide  on 
his  life  or  death,  his  speech  seems  a  sort  of  confidential 
clearing  of  his  breast  of  all  his  opinions.  He  declares  he 
has  been  the  greatest  benefactor  of  Athens.  He  tells  them 
they  ought  not  to  be  offended  at  the  resolute  tone  of  his  de- 
fence, since  it  would  be  unmanly  for  him  to  beg  and  plead 


ORTHODOX  IDEA  OF  THE!  ATONEMENT.      255 

for  life  ;  for  his  duty  was  to  instruct  them,  but  uot  to  suppli- 
cate. It  was  strange  that  so  small  a  nuijority  was  cast 
against  him  after  such  a  speech.  Then  the  custom  requii-ed 
him  to  say  himself  what  punishment  he  should  suffer. 
His  accuser  had  called  for  death.  If  he  had  named  some- 
thing less  severe,  as  exile,  fine,  imprisonment,  no  doubt  his 
life  had  been  saved.  Instead,  he  said,  "  I  propose  that  I  be 
rewarded  as  a  public  benefactor,  by  being  supported  at  the 
public  expense,  as  a  teacher  of  the  people.  Still,  as  my 
friends  wish  me  to  name  a  fine,  I  will  say  thirty  mince." 
They  took  this  as  an  insult,  and  sentenced  him  to  death. 
Then  he  spent  his  hours  in  those  immortal  conversations 
which  will  be  remembered  when  all  the  rest  of  the  glory  and 
beauty  of  Greek  literature  and  art  has  passed  away.  Every 
moment  of  his  last  hours  has  been  carefully  recorded  ;  and 
the  death  of  Socrates  gave  a  power  to  his  life,  and  his  life  an 
influence  to  his  death,  which  placed  him  among  the  names 
which  will  never  perish  from  human  memory  and  gratitude. 

There  is  another  name,  which  comes  out  of  the  darkness 
and  cruelty  of  the  middle  ages,  with  a  sweet,  serene,  and 
noble  beauty  —  a  pure  life  glorified  by  a  death  of  martyrdom. 
I  mean  that  of  Joan  of  Arc  —  the  Maid  of  Orleans.  On  her 
trial,  the  readiness  and  beauty  of  her  answers  astonished  her 
prejudiced  judges.  The  poor  girl,  only  nineteen  years  old,  a 
prisoner  in  chains,  before  these  doctors  and  lawyers,  showed 
as  much  courage  as  on  the  field  of  battle. 

They  asked  why  she  let  the  people  kiss  her  feet  and  gar- 
ments. She  answered,  "  The  poor  people  came  to  me  be- 
cause I  did  them  no  wrong,  and  helped  them  when  I  could." 
"Was  it  well  to  attack  Paris  on  Our  Lady's  day  ?  "  "  It  is 
well  to  keep  the  festivals  of  Our  Lady  always."  "  Do  your 
saints  love  the  English?"  "  They  love  what  God  loves,  and 
hate  what  he  hates."  "Does  God  hate  the  English?" 
"  As  to  his  love  or  hate  for  their  souls  I  know  nothing  ;  but 
I  know  he  will  drive  them  from  France."     "  Can  you  tell 


256    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

whether  you  will  escape  death?"  "  That  I  leave  in  God's 
hands."  When  she  went  to  death,  her  purity  and  truth  had 
so  touched  men's  hearts  that  a  great  tide  of  remorse  and  pity 
began  to  swell  up  against  her  persecutors.  A  priest,  who 
had  played  the  part  of  Judas,  and  betrayed  her,  repented 
like  Judas,  and  flung  himself  down  before  her,  accusing 
himself  of  his  treachery.  The  soldiers  who  stood  by  were 
melted.  They  said,  "  We  have  burned  a  saint."  The  exe- 
cutioner declared  that  God  would  never  forgive  him.  From 
the  day  of  her  death,  all  men  began  to  believe  in  her  holiness 
and  truth. 

Come  down  to  the  end  of  the  same  century,  and  take 
another  instance  in  Savonarola,  the  Florentine  friar  —  the 
pian  who  was  at  once  the  patriot,  leading  the  minds  of  the 
people  of  Florence  to  republican  institutions  ;  the  reformer, 
seeking  to  root  out  the  abuses  of  the  Church  ;  and  the  pro- 
phetic teacher,  preacher,  religious  inspirer.  He  also  climbed 
to  the  height  of  his  glory  on  his  funeral  pile.  As  Athens 
was  glorified  by  the  death  of  Socrates,  as  the  Maid  of  Or- 
leans has  been  a  vision  of  beauty  in  the  square  of  Rouen, 
so  the  place  in  Florence  where  Savonarola  was  murdered, 
in  front  of  the  Palazzo  Vecchio,  is  memorable  as  the  scene 
of  virtue  triumphing  over  its  enemies  and  over  evil,  when  it 
seemed  to  be  conquered.  That  day,  also,  will  never  be 
forgotten,  when  he  and  his  two  companions  walked  through 
the  furious  rabble  to  their  death,  calm  as  if  to  a  marriage 
feast.  Savonarola  was  so  absorbed  in  the  thought  of  the 
life  to  come,  says  his  biographer,  that  he  appeared  already 
to  have  left  the  earth.  He  was  put  to  death  by  the  order  of 
Alexander  Sixth,  the  worst  pope  and  worst  man  of  modern 
times  ;  but  in  twenty  years  Rafaelle  was  painting  the  monk's 
portrait  on  the  walls  of  the  Vatican  by  order  of  another  pope. 

So  it  is  that  death  glorifies  life.  If  John  Brown  had 
escaped  from  his  prison,  and  gone  to  Canada,  what  would 
have  been  his  influence?     He  would  only  have  been  remem- 


ORTHODOX  IDEA  OF  THE  ATONEMENT.      257 

bercd  as  a  crazy  fauatic.  But  now  tluTc  remains  in  all 
minds  the  picture  of  the  old  man  going  quietly  and  peace- 
fully to  die,  kissing  the  little  negro  child  on  the  way,  looking 
up  at  the  surrounding  hills,  and  admiring  the  beauty  of  the 
scenery.  Death  set  its  seal  ou  his  life,  and  so  his  soul  be- 
came the  leader  of  the  armies  of  the  Union,  going  before 
them  to  victory. 

And  how  much,  also,  was  Abraham  Lincoln  glorified  by 
his  martyr  death  !  How  he  rose  at  once  into  a  great  figure 
in  history  —  a  monumental  form  before  which  enmity  was 
silenced !  All  men  forgot  their  hostility,  their  criticisms, 
their  sneers  —  forgot  that  they  had  ever  done  anything  but 
honor  him.  The  assassin,  who  thought  to  revenge  the 
wrongs  of  the  southern  slaveholders  on  Lincoln,  gave  to 
him  a  lasting  niche  in  the  temple  of  fame. 

Now,  we  are  not  by  any  means  comparing  the  work  of 
these  persons  with  that  of  our  great  Master,  Jesus  Christ. 
Such  is  not  our  object.  We  are  only  pointing  out  the  law 
by  which  a  person  who  has  devoted  himself  to  a  great  cause, 
when  he  comes  to  die  in  its  service,  gives  to  that  cause  an 
immense  help,  and  seems  to  sanctity  and  glority  the  cause 
and  himself.  There  is  a  mystery  about  it  which  we  do  not 
fully  understand,  —  wliicii  is  not  accounted  for  by  saying 
that  death  proves  a  man's  sincerity,  and  makes  him  a  more 
competent  witness,  or  that  death  conciliates  his  enemies,  and 
puts  an  end  to  personal  dislike.  No  ;  there  is  something 
more  than  this.  AVhen  men  live  for  a  cause  outside  of  them- 
selves, when  they  labor  for  public  objects,  they  are  not  seen 
Avhile  they  live.  Those  whose  interests  are  interfered  with 
by  their  action,  misrepresent  them,  and  surround  them  with 
a  cloud  of  suspicion,  jealousy,  and  slander.  When  they  go 
to  death  for  their  cause,  all  these  slandei-ous  voices  are 
hushed,  and  they  emerge  from  this  cloud  of  prejudice,  and 
are  seen  as  they  are.  They  are  glorified  then  in  their  cause, 
and  their  cause  is  glorified  in  them.  The  cause  for  which 
22* 


258     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

Socrates  lived  was  the  education  of  the  people  of  Athens  to 
truth  and  justice.  All  the  Sophists  Avere  his  enemies.  Aris- 
tophanes ridiculed  him  as  no  other  reformer  has  ever  been 
ridiculed,  holding  him  up,  by  his  inimitable  wit,  to  the  scorn 
of  the  crowded  theatre.  When  he  died,  and  died  in  the 
faith,  all  this  ended.  Socrates  and  his  great  cause  of  justice 
rose  at  once,  and  drew  all  men  to  them.  So  Savonarola, 
who  lived  only  with  the  purpose  of  helping  on  the  triumph 
of  pure  religion  in  the  Church,  and  pure  liberty  in  the 
state,  was  mocked  and  abused  in  his  life  ;  but  his  death 
made  him  an  undying  power,  and  being  dead,  he  spoke 
across  the  rapid  years  to  Martin  Luther  and  the  reformers 
who  came  after.  John  Brown  lived  and  died  for  universal 
freedom  :  Abraham  Lincoln  lived  and  died  for  the  existence 
and  deliverance  of  the  nation.  Of  them,  exactly  as  of 
Christ,  we  may  say  that  when  they  died  the  hour  came  for 
them  to  be  glorified.  They  died,  and  they  rose  again.  The 
resurrection,  in  these  instances,  came  close  after  the  cruci- 
fixion ;  not  seen  in  their  cases,  as  in  that  of  Jesus,  by  the 
visible  eye,  but  essentially  the  same  thing  inwardly  as  his. 
They  and  their  cause  went  ujy^  instead  of  going  down,  by 
their  death.  When  they  were  lifted  up,  they  drew  all  men 
to  them.  In  all  such  deaths,  also,  there  is  a  certain  atoning, 
reconciling  influence.  Death  brings  together,  in  harmony, 
conflicting  interests  ;  it  silences  hatreds,  and  breaks  down 
many  a  partition  wall  of  separation.* 

The  difference  between  Christ's  death  and  all  of  these  is, 
that  Christ  lived  and  died  not  merely  for  popular  education, 

*  No  sooner  was  Socrates  dead  than  he  rose  to  be  the  chief  figure  in  Greek 
history.  Wliat  are  Miltiades,  Pericles,  or  Alcibiades  to  him  ?  Twenty  years 
after  Joan  of  Arc  was  burned  by  a  decree  of  tlie  Roman  Catholic  Church,  the 
same  Church  called  a  council  to  reconsider  and  reverse  her  sentence.  Twenty 
years  after  the  death  of  Savonarola,  Kafaelle  painted  his  portrait  among  the 
great  doctors,  fathers,  and  saints  in  the  halls  of  the  Vatican.  Within  a  few 
years  after  John  Brown  was  hanged,  half  a  million  of  soldiers  marched  through 
the  South  chanting  his  name  in  their  songs.  Abraham  Jiincoln  was  killed, 
and  he  is  now  the  most  influential  figure  in  our  history. 


ORTHODOX  IDEA  OF  THE  ATONEMENT.      259 

for  patriotism,  for  philanthropy,  but  to  be  the  power  of  God 
for  the  salvation  of  the  world ;  to  foimd  a  uuiversal  religion 
of  love  to  God  and  man  ;  to  reveal  God  as  a  Father,  not  a 
King ;  to  show  man  to  man  as  brother.  But  the  effect  of 
his  death,  as  in  all  these  other  cases,  was  simply  to  glorify 
his  life  and  his  cause.  The  same  law  worked  in  his  case 
and  in  theirs,  only  on  a  higher  plane,  and  for  a  vastly  greater 
object. 

We  may  observe  that  most  of  the  passages  concerning  the 
effect  of  Christ's  death  are  from  the  apostle  Paul.  They  are 
Avritten  thirty  years  after  that  death  fry  one  who  probably 
had  never  seen  him,  at  least  never  knew  him.  But  Paul 
had  seen  the  actual  effect  of  the  death  of  Jesus  on  the  minds 
and  hearts  of  the  people.  It  was  a  reconciling  effect ;  it  did 
away  with  their  hatred  to  his  religion,  and  enabled  them  to 
see  it,  and  be  led  by  it  to  God.  It  made  "  those  who  were 
afar  off,  nigh."  It  made  peace  between  man  and  God,  — 
between  man  and  man.  When  Jesus  died,  men's  eyes 
seemed  at  once  to  open,  and  they  saw  for  the  first  time  the 
beauty  and  holiness  of  his  life.  His  death,  therefore,  did 
what  his  life  had  not  done.  We,  misled  by  a  false  theology, 
imagine  Paul  to  be  speaking  of  some  transcendental  transac- 
tion in  the  spiritual  world  by  which  the  death  of  Jesus  acted 
on  God's  mind  to  make  him  placable  ;  whereas,  in  truth,  he 
is  speaking  of  the  simple  historic  fact  that  the  death  of 
Christ  did  draw  men  to  his  religion,  and  so  to  God ;  did, 
therefore,  bring  them  to  see  God's  forgiving  love  ;  did  unite 
them  with  each  other.  So  Paul  says  that  he  "  is  not 
ashamed  of  the  cross  of  Christ,"  —  not  ashamed  of  the  fact 
that  Christ  was  hanged  as  a  malefactor,  since  that  very  death 
was  the  power  of  God  to  bring  man  to  salvation.  It  made 
men  just,  and  kind,  and  true,  and  so  was  the  power  of  God. 

§  13.  Dr.  BushneWs  Vieiu  of  the  Atonement,  —  In  his 
book,  lately  published,  Dr.  Bushnell  teaches  that  the  vicari- 
ous sacrifice  of  Jesus  consists  in  his  sympathy  with  sinners. 


260     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

He  suffers  with  them  and  for  them,  as  a  friend  suffers  for  a 
friend,  or  a  mother  for  a  child,  —  in  the  same  way,  and  in 
no  exceptional  or  uncommon  way.  He  did  not  die  officially, 
but  naturally.  He  did  not  come  here  to  die,  but  he  died 
because  he  was  here. 

We  are  persuaded  that  this  is  the  right  view.  We  are 
sure  that  one  day  we  shall  all  see  that  Christ's  sufferings 
and  death,  and  their  influence,  are  as  simple,  as  natural,  as 
wholly  in  accordance  with  human  nature,  as  that  of  any 
other  saint  or  martyr ;  that  the  difference  is  of  degree,  not 
of  kind  ;  and  Chris*  will  go  before  the  world,  its  great  Re- 
deemer and  Leader,  all  the  more  certainly  because  one  of 
xxs,  —  educated,  as  we  are,  by  trial  and  sorrow  ;  tempted  as 
we  are,  but  without  sin ;  crying  out,  as  we  do,  from  the 
depths  of  our  despair,  "  My  God !  wliy  hast  thou  forsaken 
me  ?  "  and  rising,  as  we  do,  through  death  to  a  higher  life, 
through  sorrow  to  a  completer  joy,  through  the  pains  of 
earth  to  the  glories  of  heaven.  "  For  it  became  him  for 
whom  are  all  things,  and  by  whom  are  all  things,  in  bringing 
many  sons  unto  glory,  to  make  the  Captain  of  their  salvation 
perfect  through  suffering  ;  wherefore  in  all  things  it  behooved 
him  to  be  made  like  unto  his  brethren,  that  he  might  be  a 
merciful  High  Priest ;  for  in  that  he  himself  hath  suffered, 
being  tempted,  he  is  able  also  to  succor  those  who  are 
tempted.  For  we  have  not  a  High  Priest  who  cannot  be 
touched  with  the  feeling  of  our  infirmities,  but  was  in  all 
POINTS  TEMPTED  AS  WE  ARE,  yet  without  siu  ;  who  can  have 
compassion  on  the  ignorant,  as  he  also  himself  is  compassed 
with  infirmity,  and  though  a  Son,  yet  learned  obedience  by 
the  things  he  suffered." 

§  14.  Results  of  this  Discussion.  —  The  Orthodox  doctrine 
of  the  atonement  contains  a  fact  and  a  theory  which  ought  to 
be  carefully  discriminated.  The  fact  asserted  by  Orthodoxy 
is,  that  Jesus  Christ  has  done  something  by  means  of  which 
we  obtain  God's  forgiveness  for  our  sins.      The  theory  at- 


ORTHODOX  IDEA  OF  THE  ATONEMENT.      261 

tempts  to  explain  what  is  the  difficulty  in  the  way  of  our 
forgiveaess,  and  how  Christ  removes  it.  Thus  Orthodoxy 
attempts  to  answer  three  questions:  "What?"  "Why?" 
and  "  How?"  Tlie  first  of  these  regards  the  fact.  '■^What 
has  Christ  done?"  And  the  answer  is,  that  he  has  brought 
to  man  forgiveness  of  sin.  The  second  and  third  questions 
regard  the  theory.  "117;^  was  it  necessary  for  Christ  to  do 
and  suiFer  what  he  did?"  and,  ''■How  did  he  accomplish  his 
work?"   . 

Now,  as  concerns  the  matter  of  fact,  Orthodoxy  is  in  full 
accordance  with  the  Scriptures,  which  everywhere  teach 
that  through  Christ  we  have  redemption,  through  his  blood, 
even  the  forgiveness  of  our  sins.  But  the  Scriptures  are 
perfectly  silent  concerning  the  theory.  They  do  not  tell  us 
why  it  was  necessary  for  Jesus  to  die,  nor  hotu  his  death 
procured  forgiveness.  The  only  exception  is,  as  Ave  have 
seen,  in  the  statement,  in  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews,  that  the 
sufferings  of  Christ  were  necessary  to  make  him  perfect,  and 
to  enable  him  to  be  touched  with  a  feeling  of  our  infirmities. 

Of  the  three  theories  which  in  turn  have  been  regarded  as 
Orthodox  in  the  Church,  two  have  completely  broken  down, 
and  the  third  rests  on  such  an  insecure  foundation  that  we 
may  be  very  sure  that  it  will  follow  the  others  as  soon  as 
any  better  one  comes  to  take  its  place.  The  warlike  theory 
and  the  legal  theory  of  the  atonement  have  gone  to  their 
place,  and  are  no  more  believed  by  men.  The  governmental 
theory  must  soon  follow. 

Nevertheless,  in  each  of  these  three  theories  there  is 
one  constant  element.  And  it  is  due  to  Orthodoxy  to  state 
it.  This  element  is,  that  the  necessity  of  the  death  of  Christ 
lay  in  the  divine  attribute  of  justicef  According  to  the  first 
theory,  Christ  died  to  satisfy  what  was  due  by  God  to  the 
Devil ;  according  to  the  second,  he  died  to  satisfy  what  was 
due  by  God  to  himself;  according  to  the  third,  he  died  to 
satisfy  what  was  due  by  God  to  the  moral  universe.     Divine 


262  ORTHODOXY  :    ITS   TRUTHS    AND   ERRORS. 

justice,  in  the  first  theory,  owed  a  ransom  to  the  Devil,  which 
Christ  paid ;  in  the  second,  it  owed  a  debt  to  the  divine 
honor,  vi^hich  Christ  paid ;  in  the  third,  it  owed  protection  to 
the  universe  from  the  danger  of  evil  example. 

The  difficulty  to  be  removed  before  God  can  forgive  sin, 
lay,  according  to  all  of  these  theories,  in  the  divine  justice. 
Christ  died  to  reconcile  justice  and  mercy,  so  as  to  make  jus- 
tice mei'ciful,  and  mercy  just. 

But,  in  opposition  to  this  view,  the  Unitarian  argument  is 
so  formidable  as  to  seem  quite  unanswerable.  On  grounds 
of  reason,  the  Unitarian  maintains  that  there  can  be  no  such 
conflict  among  the  divine  attributes,  waiting  till  an  event 
should  occur  in  human  history  by  which  they  should  be  recon- 
ciled. That  God's  justice  and  mercy  should  have  been  in  a 
state  of  antagonism  down  to  A.  M.  4034,  when  Jesus  died,  is 
an  incredible  supposition.  No  event  taking  place  in  time  and 
space  can  be  the  condition  sine  qua  non  of  divine  perfection. 
And  any  struggle  or  conflict  like  that  supposed  implies  im- 
perfection. 

Moreover,  the  Unitarian  truly  maintains  that  the  Orthodox 
theory  that  men  cannot  be  foi'given  on  the  simple  condition 
of  repentance,  is  wholly  unscriptural.  The  Scriptures  plainly 
teach  that  forgiveness  follows  repentance.  In  the  classic.pas- 
sage  of  the  Old  Testament  (Ezek.  18  :  20-32),  the  Jews 
were  taught,  unequivocally,  that  the  death  which  is  the  wages 
of  sin,  is  always  removed  by  the  simple  act  of  repentance. 
If  the  modern  doctrine  of  Orthodoxy  be  true,  that  in  order  to 
be  saved  it  is  necessary  not  only  to  repent,  but  also  to  believe 
in  the  atoning  sacrifice,  the  Jew^s  were  fatally  misled  by  this 
teaching  of  the  prophet. 

And  so  in  the  New  Testament,  the  parable  of  the  prodi- 
gal son  teaches  us  plainly  that  when  we  repent  and  return  to 
God,  we  shall  be  received,  and  that  without  any  reference  to 
belief  in  the  atonement. 

Moreover,  the  Unitarians  are  fully  justified  in  saying  that 


ORTHODOX  IDEA  OF  THE  ATONEMENT.      263 

the  New  Testameut  nowhere  asserts  that  the  primary  and 
immediate  influence  of  the  death  of  Jesus  is  upon  the  divine 
attributes.  In  every  instance  Christ  is  said  to  reconcile  us 
to  God,  never  to  reconcile  God  to  us.  (See  Rom.  5  :  10, 
11;  11:15.  2  Cor.  5:18,  19,  20.  Eph.  2:13,  16. 
Coloss.  1  :  20,  21.  1  Peter  3  :  18.)  It  is  we  "  who  were 
afar  off,  and  have  been  made  nigh,  by  the  blood  of  Christ." 
It  is  we,  '•  who,  when  we  Avere  enemies,  were  reconciled  to 
God  by  the  death  of  his  Son  ; "  not  God,  who  was  afar  off, 
who  has  been  brought  nigh  to  us ;  not  God,  wlio  has  been 
reconciled  to  us.  It  is  "  we,  who  have  received  the  atone- 
ment." Christ  has  suffered  for  sins,  "  to  bring  us  to  God," 
not  to  bring  God  to  us.  All  this  is  plain,  positive,  and  un- 
equivocal. 

And  yet,  notwithstanding  that  the  Old  and  New  Testa- 
ments declare  the  forgiveness  of  sin  to  the  penitent,  we  never- 
theless find  a  difficulty  in  believing  it.  It  seems  as  if  God 
ought  not  to  forgive  us  our  sins  on  so  simple  a  condition. 
And  it  is  on  this  very  feeling  that  the  whole  Orthodox  theory 
of  the  atonement  rests. 

The  explanation  of  this  is,  that  man  is  obliged  to  under- 
stand God  by  himself.  Since  man  was  made  in  the  image 
of  God,  he  can  know  God  only  by  understanding  the  moral 
and  spiritual  laws  of  his  own  soul.  Now,  in  himself,  he 
finds  the  constant  antagonism  of  truth  and  love,  justice  and 
mercy,  conscience  and  desire.  From  this  essential  original 
antagonism  of  truth  and  love  spring  all  the  moral  conflicts 
which  make  cases  of  conscience.  Whenever  we  see  before 
us  a  divided  duty,  on  being  analyzed,  it  resolves  itself  into 
this  conflict  between  truth  and  love.  We  naturally,  and 
almost  necessarily,  transfer  this  same  conflict  to  the  mind  of 
God.  AVhenever  we  wish  to  forgive  an  offender,  but  feel  as 
if  we  ought  not  to  do  so,  we  teach  ourselves  to  regard  God 
as  feeling  the  same  difficulty.  Conscience  tells  us  that  we 
are  not  fit  to  be  forgiven,  that  it  would  be  wrong  for  God  to 


264    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

forgive  us.  Orthodoxy  plants  itself  on  this  instinct,  and 
elaborates  its  various  theories,  which  men  accept  for  a  time 
as  a  sufficient  explanation  of  their  difficulty,  and  then  reject 
when  their  inconsistencies  appear.  The  deep-lying  difficulty 
is  the  sense  of  our  want  of  holiness,  and  the  instinctive 
feeling  of  the  eternal  mutual  repulsion  of  good  and  evil. 
Since  God  is  good,  and  we  are  evil,  how  can  he  forgive  us? 
If  forgiveness  merely  meant  the  remitting  of  penalty,  it  might 
be  done  after  sufficient  expiation.  If  forgiveness  meant  lay 
ing  aside  of  anger,  we  can  well  believe  that  God  cannot 
retain  wrath  against  his  children.  But  forgiveness  means 
communion^  the  mutual  love  of  father  and  child,  the  being 
always  in  the  presence  of  God.  And  for  this,  even  after  we 
have  repented,  and  are  endeavoring  to  do  right,  Ave  do  not 
feel  ourselves  qualified. 

This  is  the  real  difficulty.  Christ  did  not  die  to  pay  a  debt 
to  God,  or  to  appease  his  wrath,  but  "  to  bring  us  to  God," 
and  to  put  the  Spirit  into  our  heart  by  which  we  can  say, 
"Abba,  Father  !  "  The  atonement  is  made  to  the  divine  jus- 
tice—  but  not  to  distributive  justice,  which  rewards  and 
punishes,  but  to  divine  justice  in  its  highest  form,  as  holiness^ 
And  this  consists  in  making  us  fit  to  appear  before  God, 
notwithstanding  our  sinfulness,  because  we  have  received  a 
principle  of  holiness  which  will  ultimately  cast  out  all  our 
sin.  When  we  have  faith  in  Christ,  we  have  Christ  formed 
within  us,  the  hope  of  glory.  God,  looking  on  us,  sees  us 
not  as  we  are  now,  but  as  we  shall  be  when  we  are  changed 
into  that  same  image  from  glory  to  greater  glory. 

This  suggests  the  theory  which  may  replace  the  rest,  ainl 
reconcile  all  those  who  believe  in  Christ  as  the  Saviour  and 
Redeemer  of  men.  Christ  saves  us  by  pouring  into  us  his 
own  life,  which  is  love.  When  Christian  love  is  formed 
within  us,  it  has  killed  the  roots  of  sin  in  the  soul,  and  fitted 
us  to  be  forgiven,  and  to  enter  the  presence  of  God. 

In   conclusion,   we   may  say  that  Orthodoxy  is   right   in 


ORTHODOX  IDEA  OP  THE  ATONEMENT.      265 

luaiutiiiuiug  that  Jesus  has  by  his  sufferings  aud  death 
brought  forgiveness  to  mankind  —  not  by  propritiating  God 
or  appeasing  his  anger,  not  by  paying  our  debt  or  removing 
a  dilliculty  in  the  divine  mind,  but  by  helping  us  to  sec  that 
the  love  of  God  is  able  to  lilt  us  out  of  our  sin,  and  present 
us  spotless  in  the  presence  of  his  glory  with  exceeding  joy. 
The  way  in  which  his  death  produces  this  result  is  the  sym- 
pathy with  human  sinfulness  and  sorrow,  which  finds  in  it 
its  highest  expression.  Those  whom  men  cannot  forgive, 
and  who  cannot  forgive  themselves,  see  that  God,  speaking 
through  the  sufferings  of  Jesus,  is  able  to  forgive  them.  So 
the  love  of  God  brings  them  to  repentance,  and  those  who 
were  afar  off  are  made  nigh  by  the  blood  of  Christ. 
23 


266     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 


CHAPTER    XI. 

CALLING,    ELECTION,    AND   REPROBATION. 

§1.  Orthodox  Doctrine.  —  The  Assembly's  Catechism, 
with  its  usual  frankness,  states  this  doctrine  thus :  — 
(chap.  3). 

I.  "  God,  from  all  eternity,  did,  by  the  most  wise  and  holy 
counsel  of  his  own  will,  freely  and  unchangeably  ordain  what- 
soever Cometh  to  pass,  yet  so  that  neither  is  God  the  author 
of  sin,  nor  is  violence  offered  to  the  will  of  the  creatures,  nor 
is  the  liberty  or  contingency  of  second  causes  taken  away, 
but  rather  established. 

II.  "  Although  God  knows  whatsoever  may  or  can  come 
to  pass  upon  all  supposed  conditions,  yet  hath  he  not  decreed 
anything  because  he  foresaw  it  as  future,  or  as  that  which 
would  come  to  pass  upon  such  conditions. 

III.  "  By  the  decree  of  God,  for  the  manifestation  of  his 
glory,  some  men  and  angels  are  predestinated  unto  everlast- 
ing life,  and  others  foreordained  to  everlasting  death. 

IV.  "  These  angels  and  men,  thus  predestinated  and  fore- 
ordained, are  particularly  and  unchangeably  designed,  and 
their  number  is  so  certain  and  definite,  that  it  cannot  be  either 
increased  or  diminished. 

V.  "Those  of  mankind  that  are  predestinated  unto  life, 
God,  before  the  foundation  of  the  world  was  laid,  according 
to  his  eternal  and  immutable  purpose,  and  the  secret  counsel 
and  good  pleasure  of  his  will,  hath  chosen  in  Christ  imto 
everlasting  glory,  out  of  his  mere  free  grace  and  love,  with- 
out any  foresight  of  faith  or  good  works,  or  perseverance  in 
either  of  them,  or  any  other  thing  in  the  creature,  as  condi- 


CALLING,    ELECTION,    AND    REPROBATION.  207 

tions  or  causes  moving  him  thereunto,  and  all  to  the  praise 
of  his  glorious  grace. 

VI.  "  As  God  hath  appointed  the  elect  unto  glory,  so  hath 
he,  by  the  eternal  and  most  free  purpose  of  his  will,  fore- 
ordained all  the  means  thereunto.  Wherefore  they  who  are 
elected,  being  fallen  in  Adam,  arc  redeemed  by  Christ ;  are 
effectually  called  unto  faith  in  Christ,  by  his  Spirit  working 
in  due  season  ;  arc  justified,  adopted,  sanctified,  and  kept  by 
his  power  through  faith  unto  salvation.  Neither  are  any 
other  redeemed  by  Christ,  ciFcctually  called,  justified,  adopted, 
sanctified,  aud  saved,  but  the  elect  only. 

VII.  "  The  rest  of  mankind  God  was  pleased,  according 
to  the  unsearchable  counsel  of  his  own  will,  whereby  he  ex- 
tendeth  or  withholdeth  mercy  as  he  pleaseth,  for  the  glory 
of  his  sovereign  power  over  his  creatures,  to  pass  by,  and  to 
ordain  them  to  dishonor  and  wrath  for  their  sin,  to  the  praise 
of  his  glorious  justice." 

This  statement  is  contained  in  the  creed  of  more  than  three 
thousand  churches  in  the  United  States.  So  far  as  it  is  be- 
lieved by  those  who  profess  it,  it  conveys  the  idea  of  a  God 
who  is  pure  will  —  a  God,  in  short,  who  does  as  he  pleases, 
saving  some  of  his  creatures  and  damning  others,  without 
reason  or  justice.  He  does  not  reward  virtue  nor  punish 
sin,  but  scatters  the  joys  of  heaven  and  the  torments  of  hell 
out  of  a  mere  caprice,  as  an  Eastern  despot  gives  a  man  a 
purse  of  gold,  or  inflicts  the  bastinado,  without  reason,  sim- 
ply to  gratify  his  sense  of  power.  The  essential  character 
of  such  a  Being  is  arbitrary  will,  and  this  creed  of  Calvinism 
places  an  infinite  caprice  on  the  thi'one  of  the  universe,  in- 
stead of  the  Being  whom  the  Gospels  call  "  Our  Father." 

Let  us  see  how  far  this  view  of  God  is  mitigated  by  mod- 
ern explanations. 

The  Old  School  Presbyterianism,  or  Princeton  Orthodoxy, 
accepts  it  in  its  entireness.  They  simply  deny  the  conse- 
quences supposed  to  be  drawn  from  it.     They  deny  that  it 


268         orthodoxy:  its  trtjths  and  errors. 

makes  God  the  author  of  sin,  or  that  sinful  dispositions  are 
created  by  God.  They  deny  that  this  doctrine  interferes 
with  freedom  of  will  in  man.  But  they  are  obliged  to  admit 
that,  according  to  their  creed,  God  decrees  things  which  he 
forbids  ;  for,  "  inasmuch  as  many  things  occur  contrary  to 
his  commands,  while  yet  he  foreordains  all  things,  it  must 
be  that  in  these  cases  he  purposes  one  thing  and  commands 
another."  *  In  other  words,  God  sends  his  prophets,  and  apos- 
tles, and  Son,  to  command  men  to  do  justly  and  love  mercy, 
when  he  has  already  determined  that  they  shall  commit  sin. 
This  school  rejects  the  Arminian  doctrine  that  God's  decree 
is  founded  on  his  foreknowledge,  and  asserts  that  his  fore- 
knowledge is  based  on  his  decree. 

The  Old  School  in  New  England  do  not  go  quite  so  far  as 
Princeton.  They  say,  decidedly,  that  God  foreordains  sin 
only  by  permitting  it.  Still,  they  reject,  as  stoutly  as  their 
sterner  confreres^  the  Arminian  view,  and  insist  that  God's 
decrees  are  not  based  on  his  foreknowledge.f 

According  to  Dr.  Duffield,  of  Detroit,  the  New  School 
Presbyterians  escape  the  pinch  of  this  conflict  by  taking 
refuge  in  their  ignorance.  They  are  not  "  Ultra-Calvinists," 
and  they  are  not  "  Arminians,"  and  especially  they  "  do  not 
wish  to  be  wise  above  what  is  written."  %  Dr.  D.  asserts 
that  the  Old  School  makes  the  decree  in  election  to  be  wholly 
arbitraiy,  while  the  New  School  believes  that  it  has  a  reason, 
though  one  wholly  unknown.  But  the  Hopkinsians  §  say 
that  "  the  sovereignty  of  God  belongs  to  him  as  the  Supreme 
Disposer,  and  consists  in  his  perfect  right  and  perfect  ability 

*  "Doctrinal  Attitude  of  Old  School  Presbyterians."  By  Lyman  B.  At- 
water,  Professor  of  Mental  and  Moral  Philosopliy  in  Princeton  College.  Bib- 
liotheca  Sacra,  January,  186-1. 

t  "  The  Old  School  iu  New  England  Theology."  By  Professor  Lawrence,  of 
East  Windsor.    Bibliotheca  Sacra,  April,  1863. 

X  "  Doctrines  of  the  New  School  Presbyterians."  By  Rev.  George  Duffield, 
D.  D.,  of  Detroit.    Bibliotheca  Sacra,  July,  18G3. 

§  "  Hopkinsianism."  By  Rev.  Enoch  Pond,  D.  D.,  Professor  in  Bangor 
Theological  Seminary,    Bibliotheca  Sacra,  July,  1862. 


CALLING,    ELECTION,    AND    REPROBATION.  269 

to  do  as  he  pleases."  Of  course,  having  made  the  will  of 
God  wholly  arbitrary,  they  proceed  to  deny  that  it  is  arbi- 
trary, or  tluit  wilfuluess  iu  God  can  possibly  be  wilful.  But 
all  this  is  using  "words  of  wind  ibr  the  Almighty,"  and 
"  accepting  his  person." 

Methodism,  on  the  contrary,  denies  that  God  foreordains 
whatsoever  comes  to  pass,  holding  foreordinatiou  to  be  a 
causative  act.*  It  also  denies  tliat  man  is  guilty  for  inher- 
ited sin,  or  in  any  way  responsible  lor  liis  depraved  nature. 
He  only  becomes  I'csponsible  when  he  begins  to  act  freely. 
He  may  suffer  for  inherited  evil,  but  cannot  justly  be  pun- 
ished for  it.  Thus  Methodism  avoids  the  rude  injustice  of 
the  Calvinistic  system.  And  yet,  as  Schleiermacher  has 
shown, f  if  it  accepts  total  depravity,  it  must  also  consistently 
accept  the  Calvinistic  doctrine  of  election.  For  if  man  is 
totally  depraved,  he  cannot  take  a  single  step  towards  his  own 
salvation.  God  must,  in  every  case,  take  the  initiative,  and 
begin  the  convei-sion  of  each  man  who  is  converted.  There- 
fore, if  we  ask  why  one  man  is  converted,  and  another  not, 
the  only  answer  possible  is  this  —  that  God  chose  to  convert 
one,  and  not  the  other.  Schleiermacher  accepts  and  defends 
the  doctrine  of  election,  but  by  connecting  it  with  tliat  of 
universal  restoration,  which  reduces  it  to  the  statement  that 
God  saves  all,  but  in  a  certain  order,  which  ox'dcr  is  deter- 
mined by  himself,  without  regard  to  any  foresight  oY  merit  or 
demerit  in  man. 

§2.  Scripture  Basis  for  this  Doctrine. — The  principal 
passages  relied  upon  for  the  doctrine  of  absolute  decrees  are 
found  in  Rom.  8  :  30,  and  9  :  8-24.  In  these  passages,  Paul 
is,  no  doubt,  speaking  of  an  unconditional  election.     In  the 

*  "  Doctrines  of  Methodism."  By  Rev.  Dr.  Whedon.  Bibliotheca  Sacra, 
April,  ISGii. 

t  "  Tlieologische  Zeitscrift."  Herausgegebcn  von  Dr.  Fricdr.  Schleierma- 
cher, Dr.  "W.  M.  L.  DcWette,  und  Dr.  Friedr.  Luckc.  Erstes  Heft,  Berlin, 
1819.    Ueber  die  Lehre  von  dcr  JErwdhlung. 

23* 


270  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS    AND    ERRORS. 

first,  he  declares  that  the  gift  of  Christianity  to  those  who 
received  it  was  no  accident.  God  had  known  them  long  ago 
as  individuals,  known  them  before  they  were  born,  known 
the  character  they  were  to  have.  He  had  foreordained  theui 
to  become  Christians,  to  be  made  into  the  likeness  of  Christ. 
He  had  called  them  to  be  Christians  by  his  providen  e ;  he 
had  forgiven  them  their  sins ;  he  had  glorified  them,  filling 
them  with  the  glory  of  the  new  life  of  faith  and  love.  In 
the  other  passage,  Paul  shows  the  Jews  that  God  selects 
races  and  families,  not  according  to  any  merit  of  theirs,  but 
for  reasons  of  his  own,  to  do  his  work.  Ishmael  as  well  as 
Isaac  was  a  child  of  Abraham,  but  Isaac  was  selected. 
Esau  as  well  as  Jacob  was  a  child  of  Isaac,  but  Jacob  was 
selected.  It  is  no  merit  of  the  man  which  causes  him  to  be 
chosen,  no  fault  which  causes  him  to  be  rejected,  but  that 
one  is  made  for  the  work,  and  the  other  not.  One  is  in- 
fluenced to  obey  and  sei've  ;  one  is  allov/ed  to  resist  God's 
will ;  and  yet  both  of  them  —  he  who  obeys  and  he  who 
resists  —  serve  the  divine  purpose.  The  Jewish  Christians, 
therefore,  may  believe  that  their  nation,  in  resisting  Christ,  is 
blindly  serving  the  providential  designs  of  God,  and  mak- 
ing Avay  for  the  Gentiles  to  come  in  ;  and  then,  the  Gentiles, 
in  turn,  will  help  them  to  come  in,  "  and  so  all  Israel  shall 
be  saved."  But  in  neither  of  these  passages  is  any  reference 
to  final  salvation  or  damnation.  All  that  is  spoken  of  is  the 
predestined  and  divinely  arranged  order,  the  providential 
method,  in  which  gifts  are  bestowed  and  opportunities  of- 
fei'cd.  In  fact,  in  Rom.  11 :  28,  election  is  formally  opposed 
to  the  gospel.  As  regards  the  gospel,  or  tlie  reception  of 
Christianity,  the  Jews  are  enemies  ;  that  is,  are  left  out  of  the 
circle  of  God's  gifts,  in  order  that  the  Gentiles  may  come  in. 
But  as  regards  the  election,  they  are  still  the  chosen  people, 
inheriting  all  the  qualities,  powers,  position,  which  their 
fathers  had   before   them,  since  God   never  takes  back  his 


CALLING,    ELECTION,    AND    REPROBATION.  271 

gifts.*  So  also  in  Ephesians  1:5,  11,  Paul  says  that  wc, 
Christiaus,  have  been  choseu  iu  Christ  before  the  tbuiuhitiou 
of  the  world,  aud  predestined  to  be  adopted  as  children,  and 
obtained  au  inheritance  in  Christianity.  But  neither  here  is 
anything  intended  couccruiug  final  salvation.  It  all  refers  tc 
tlieir  having  received  the  gilt  of  Christian  faith,  in  the  plan 
of  God,  by  a  wise  providence  of  his,  and  not  by  accident. 
So  also,  in  Timothy  (2  Tim.  1:9),  Paul  says  that  God  hath 
saved  us  out  of  the  world,  aud  called  us  to  be  Christians,  not 
because  of  any  merit  of  ours,  but  simply  according  to  a 
gracious  purpose  which  he  always  had,  that  the  Gentiles 
should  come  into  his  kingdom  with  the  Jews.  In  none  of 
these  passages  is  any  final  doom  or  destiny  hereafter  intended  : 
all  of  them  refer  to  the  gift  of  Christianity  in  this  world. 
The  apostle  softens  the  exultation  of  the  Gentiles,  and  consoles 
the  sorrow  of  the  Jewish  Christians,  by  telling  them  that  the 
acceptance  of  the  Gentiles  and  rejection  of  the  majority  of  the 
Jews  is  part  of  a  great  plan  of  Providence,  which  will  finally 
redoimd  to  the  good  of  both. 

§  3.  Relation  of  the  Divine  Decree  to  Human  Freedom. — 
In  order  that  God  shall  be  the  Ruler  of  the  world,  and  its 
providence,  he  must  know  the  course  of  events,  and  deter- 
mine them.  In  order  that  man  shall  be  responsible,  and  a 
moral  being,  he  must  be  free  to  choose,  at  every  moment, 
between  right  and  wrong,  good  and  evil.  In  part  of  his 
nature  and  life,  man  is  a  creature  of  destiny ;  in  part,  he  is 
the  creator  of  destiny.  Every  man's  character  is  the  result 
of  three  factors — organization,  education,  and  freedom.  The 
character  he  has  now  has  come  to  him,  partly  from  the 
organization  with  which  he  was  born,  partly  from  the  in- 
fluences by  which  he  has  been  educated,  and  partly  from  what 

♦  Kom.  11 :  29.  "  The  gifts  and  callings  of  God  are  without  repentance."  By 
this  we  understand  the  apostle  to  mean  the  same  thing  as  is  implied  in  Eccle- 
siastes  (3 :  14) :  "  I  know  that  what  God  doeth,  it  is  forever."  God,  having 
chosen  the  Jews  for  a  work,  will  continue  to  them  the  gifts,  and  will  sec  that 
eomehow  or  other,  Bome  time  or  other,  the  work  is  done. 


272  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

he  has  done  or  omitted  to  do  at  every  moment  of  his  life. 
Now,  the  two  first  of  these  factors  are  out  of  his  power.  A 
man  born  in  Africa,  or  descended  from  Chinese  pa:  ents,  can- 
not, by  any  choice  or  effort,  become  what  a  man  born  3f  French 
or  German  parents  may  become.  A  man  born  among  the 
Turks  or  Arabs,  and  educated  by  the  circumstances  surround- 
ing him  there,  must  be  a  wholly  different  man  from  one  born 
in  New  England.  Man's  freedom,  therefore,  may  be  likened 
to  the  power  of  the  helmsman  to  direct  a  vessel.  He  cannot 
determine  what  sort  of  a  vessel  he  shall  be  in,  nor  what  sort 
of  weather  or  currents  shall  come :  all  he  can  do  at  any  mo- 
ment is  to  steer  it  to  the  right  or  left.  If,  now,  in  steering,  he 
guides  himself  by  a  compass  turning  to  a  fixed  point,  and  by 
a;  chart  giving  the  true  position  of  continents  and  islands,  then 
this  power  enables  him,  in  spite  of  storms  and  calms,  to  take 
the  vessel  round  the  world,  to  the  harbor  he  seeks.  But  if  he 
has  no  chart  and  compass,  but  steers  as  he  chooses  from 
moment  to  moment,  he  goes  nowhere.  His  vessel  will  then 
drift  before  the  steady  winds,  and  constant  currents.  So  is 
human  freedom  a  great  power  when  it  guides  itself  by  eternal 
truths  and  fixed  laws.  But  if  it  does  not,  then  it  is  not  free- 
dom, but  only  wilfulness,  and  it  accomplishes  nothing.  Man's 
freedom  is  thus  surrounded  by  divine  providence.  God  de- 
termines the  original  organization  of  every  human  being ; 
God  determines  the  circumstances  which  educate  him ;  and 
God  has  fixed  the  laws  by  which  he  must  guide  himself  in 
order  to  become  really  free.  He  cannot  therefore  resist  the 
divine  will,  except  temporarily.  He  can  postpone  the  time 
when  God's  kingdom  shall  come,  and  his  will  be  done  ;  but 
that  is  all. 

§  4.  History  of  the  Doctrine  of  Election  and  Predestina- 
tion.—  Before  Augustine,  all  the  Greek  and  Latin  Fathers  of 
the  Church  taught  the  concurrence  of  free  will  and  grace  in 
human  conversion.     They  taught  that  man  must  begin  the 


CALLING,    ELECTION,    AND    REPROBATION.  273 

work,  and  that  God  would  aid  him.  God  and  man  must 
work  together. 

Then  came  the  controversy  between  Augustine  and  Pela- 
gius.  The  latter,  being  at  Rome,  heard  this  sentence  read 
from  the  writings  of  the  former :  "  Da  quod  jubes,  et  jube 
quod  vis"  —  Giv-e  what  thou  commandest,  and  command 
what  thou  wiliest.  Pelagius  objected  to  this  formula.  He 
said,  "  Since  man  ought  to  be  without  sin,  he  can  be  without 
sin."  "  There  is,"  said  he,  "  in  man,  a  '  Can  Do,'  a  '  Will 
Do,'  and  a  '  Do.' "  The  first  is  from  God  ;  in  the  others 
God  and  man  imite. 

Augustine  objected  that  God  worked  in  us  both  to  will  and 
to  do.  He  had  first  taught  that  God  sends  motives  which  we 
can  obey  or  resist ;  but  he  saw  that  if  God  works  in  us  to 
will,  he  must  also  conquer  our  resistance,  and  work  the  power 
by  which  we  consent. 

But  to  this  Pelagius  replied,  "  Then  there  is  no  freedom 
in  man." 

Augustine  answered,  "  God  does  not  move  us  as  we  move 
a  stone,  but  rationally ;  he  makes  us  will  what  is  good,  and 
does  not  force  us  against  our  will.  He  frees  the  will  from 
its  proclivity  to  evil,  by  '  preparing  grace,'  and  determines  it 
to  good  by  '  effecting  grace.'  That  some  do  not  yield  to  this, 
is  not  because  of  their  greater  resistance,  but  because  God 
does  not  choose  to  conquer  their  resistance." 

This  is  the  point  where  grace  passes  into  predestination. 

The  Old  Church  had  maintained  that  God  predestined  to 
lifo  those  whom  he  foresaw  would  repent  and  obey  him.  His 
foreknowledge  did  not  cause  this  to  happen,  but  he  foreknew 
it  because  it  would  happen.  It  did  not  take  place  because 
he  foresaw  it,  but  he  foresaw  it  because  it  would  take  place. 

Election,  according  to  the  early  Fathers,  was  nothing  arbi- 
trary. It  depended  on  man  to  be  saved  or  lost.  So  taught 
Justin  Martyr,  Origen,  Basil,  Hilary. 

Basil  said,  "  God  hardened  Pharaoh's  heart  by  his  judg- 


274    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

ments,  which  were  sent  to  show  how  hard  it  was,  because 
he  saw  he  would  not  repent." 

Origen  adds,  "  Like  a  wise  physician,  God  did  not  cure 
Pharaoh  too  soon,  for  fear  of  a  relapse.  He  let  him  drink 
the  cup  of  sin  to  the  bottom  in  this  life,  so  as  to  cure  him 
more  thoroughly  hereafter." 

Pelagius  (and  Augustine  at  first)  took  the  same  view. 
They  said  that  God  foresees  and  permits  evil,  and  decreei* 
the  consequence  of  it. 

Augustine  said,  "God  has  chosen  some  men  in  Christ,  not 
because  he  foresaw  they  would  be  good,  but  because  he  de- 
termined to  make  them  so."  The  reason  of  this  choice, 
therefore,  lay  not  in  man,  but  in  God's  arbitrary  will. 

Pelagius  said,  "  This  is  fatalism,  under  the  name  of  grace, 
and  is  saying  that  God  accepts  the  persons  of  men." 

Augustine  answered,  "  All  men  in  Adam  are  in  ruin.  God 
saves  some  of  them.  If  he  let  all  die,  we  could  not  blame 
him  :  how  much  less  for  saving  some  !  " 

But  why  does  he  not  save  all?     The  answer  is,  — 

Because  the  elect  see  in  the  fate  of  the  non-elect  what 
they  have  escaped,  and  God's  justice  is  revealed  with  his 
goodness. 

None  of  the  elect  perish,  though  they  may  die  unbaptized, 
and  be  ever  so  bad  in  their  lives  ;  but  they  will  be  all  con- 
verted before  they  die. 

The  non-elect  may  be  often  better  men  than  the  elect ;  but 
they  will  not  be  saved. 

The  only  place  where  Augustine  allows  freedom  is  in 
Adam,  who  might  have  turned  either  way. 

Semi-Pelagianism  consists  essentially  in  saying,  "  Man 
begins  the  work  ;   Grod  aids  him." 

Augustine's  view  was  carried  out  afterwards  thus :  "  If 
God  does  all,  it  is  no  use  to  preach,  exhort,  or  read  Scrip- 
ture, or  use  any  means  of  grace." 

Augustine  had  said  that  reprobation  was  not  a  decree  to 
sin,  but  to  punishment. 


CALLING,    ELECTION,    AND    REPROBATION.  275 

But  Gottschalk,  his  t'ollowor,  suid  it  was  a  decree  to  sin. 
The  Church  rejected  this  statement,  and  softened  the  doc- 
trine.    Thomas  Aquinas  revived  it  again, 

Luther  and  Calvin  both  maintained  that  there  is  no  good 
in  man  after  the  fall.  Flacius  said  that  original  sin  is  the 
substance  of  human  nature,  and  human  nature  now  bears  the 
image  of  the  devil. 

Luther  made  freedom  of  the  will  to  consist  in  doing  evil 
with  pleasure,  and  not  by  constraint. 

Calvin  denied  that  there  is  any  free  will.  "  Why  give  it 
such  a  lofty  title?"  he  said.  He  seemed  to  think  that  all  the 
power  left  to  men  is  so  much  taken  from  God. 

When  God  says,  "  Do  this  and  live,"  it  is,  says  Luther, 
merely  irony  on  his  part,  as  though  he  had  said,  "  See  if  you 
can  do  it !     Try  it." 

Luther  actually  taught  that  God's  will  in  revealed  Scripture 
was,  that  all  should  be  saved,  but  his  real  and  secret  will  was, 
that  not  all  should  be  saved. 

Melancthon  said,  "Man  has  no  power  by  himself  to  do 
right ;  but  when  grace  is  offered,  he  can  receive  it  or  re- 
ject it." 

Calvin  went  beyond  Augustine.     He  taught  that, — 

1.  The  decree  of  predestination  was  not  merely  a  decree 
to  punishment,  but  to  sin.  He  rejects  with  scorn  the  distinc- 
tion between  permitting  and  causing,  between  foreknowledge 
and  predestination.  He  says  it  is  improper  to  have  God's 
decree  waiting  on  men's  choice. 

2.  He  taught  that  Adam's  sin  was  decreed  by  God.  The 
Tnlralapsarian  taught  that  God  foresaw  that  Adam  would 
sin,  and  so  decreed  some  men  to  life,  and  others  to  death. 
The  Supralapsarian  taught  that  God  determined  to  reveal 
his  majesty,  and  mercy,  and  justice.  He  created  men,  and 
made  them  miserable  to  shoAV  his  mercy,  and  made  them 
sinful  to  show  his  justice. 

3.  If  men  complain  that  God  has  so  created  them,  Calvin 


276     OETHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

answers,  God  has  the  same' right  that  the  potter  has  over  the 
clay,  If  they  complain  that  God  has  chosen  some,  and  not 
others,  to  life,  he  replies,  that  so  oxen,  horses,  and  sheep 
might  complain  that  they  were  not  men. 

4.  God  causes  the  sin  which  he  forbids.  This  is  not  a 
contradiction  in  him,  for  his  nature  is  different  from  ours. 

God  created  all  for  his  own  glory,  and  sinners  to  glorify 
his  justice. 

Finally,  Calvin  himself  admits  that  this  is  "  a  horrible 
decree." 

§  5.  Election  is  to  Work  and  Opportunity  here,  not  to  Heaven 
hereafter.  Mow  Jacob  was  elected,  and  how  the  Jews  were  a 
Chosen  People.  —  This  reductio  ad  absurdum  disproves  the 
common  idea  of  election.  If  a  man  were  elected  by  God 
to  heaven,  and  so  could  not  help  going  to  heaven,  it  would 
not  be  worth  his  while  to  give  diligence  to  make  his  call- 
ing and  election  sure.  It  is  sure  already,  without  any  dili- 
gence. 

The  common  Orthodox  idea  of  election  is,  therefore,  a 
false  one.  God  does  not  elect,  or  choose  us,  for  passive 
enjoyment,  but  for  active  duty.  He  elects  us  to  opportuni- 
ties. He  elects,  or,  as  we  may  say,  selects,  us  for  certain 
special  work,  gives  us  certain  special  privileges,  and  holds 
us  to  an  accountability  for  the  use  of  them. 

In  the  parable  of  the  talents,  God  elected,  or  selected,  one 
man  to  the  possession  of  five  talents,  another  to  the  possession 
of  two,  and  another  one.  Each  was  elected ;  but  each  was 
elected  to  opportunities,  and  each  to  a  different  opportunity ; 
but  they  all  had  to  give  diligence  to  make  their  calling  and 
election  sure. 

The  word  "elect"  was  first  applied  to  the  Jews.  They 
were  an  elect  or  chosen  people.  They  were  selected  from 
among  all  nations  for  a  great  duty  and  opportunity.  They 
were  taught  the  unity  of  God  and  his  holiness.  They  were 
a  city  set  on  a  hill,  a  light  shining  in  the  dax'kness  of  the 


CALLING,    ELECTION,    AND   REPROBATION.  277 

world,  to  proclaim  these  truths.  That  was  their  opportunity. 
It  was  not  happiness,  or  heaven,  or  even  goodness,  that  they 
were  chosen  for,  but  wORic.  As  long  as  they  continued  to 
do  this  work,  they  continued  to  be  God's  chosen  or  selected 
people.  But  when  they  hardened  into  the  bigotry  of  Phari- 
seeism,  and  froze  into  the  scepticism  of  Sadduceeism,  when 
they  ceased  to  do  the  work,  then  they  ceased  to  be  the  elect 
people.  While  they  were  diligent  to  make  their  election 
sure,  they  were  the  elect,  but  no  longer. 

God  selected  Jacob  and  rejected  Esau.  "  Jacob  have  I 
loved,  and  Esau  have  I  hated."  But  how  did  God  love 
Jacob?  He  loved  him  by  giving  him  opportunity.  And 
why?  Not  because  he  was  better  than  Esau,  but  because 
he  was  diiferent.  Jacob  was  selected  to  be  father  of  the 
chosen  people  because  he  had  the  qualities  required  for  his 
work.  Esau  was  wild,  reckless,  martial.  Jacob  was  indus- 
trious, money-making,  fond  of  small  trade  ;  pastoral,  rather 
than  warlike ;  tenacious  of  his  ideas  even  to  obstinacy. 
These  were  the  qualities  required  in  a  people  who  were  so 
few  that  if  they  had  been  warlike  they  would  have  been 
swept  from  the  earth.  They  never  fought  for  the  pleasure 
of  fighting,  but  only  when  they  could  not  help  it,  or  when  a 
political  necessity  compelled  it.  Though  surrounded  by 
nations  much  more  powerful  than  themselves,  —  the  Assyr- 
ians on  the  north-east  at  Nineveh,  the  Egyptians  on  the 
south-west,  the  Babylonians  on  the  east,  the  Tyrians  on  the 
west,  and  the  Greekson  the  north-west,  —  they  saw  the  fall 
of  all  these  great  nations  and  empires,  but  they  continued. 
Many  waves  of  war  swept  over  their  Syrian  hills,  and  left 
them  still  there,  peaceful,  industrious,  worshipping  Jehovah 
in  their  sacred  city,  offering  no  motive  for  conquest,  too 
poor  to  tempt  invasion,  too  far  from  the  sea  to  grow  rich  by 
commerce,  like  the  Phoenicians.  Their  obscurity,  poverty, 
and  unheroic  qualities  were  their  salvation,  and  these  they 
derived  apparently  from  Jacob,  their  ancestor. 
24 


278    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

Thus  we  see  that  the  Jews  were  a  chosen  people,  and  we 
see  what  they  were  chosen  for,  and  also  that  they  were 
chosen  not  because  of  superior  virtue,  but  for  superior 
capacity. 

§  6.  How  other  Nations  were  elected  and  called.  — 
Other  nations  were  chosen,  too,  for  other  purposes.  The 
Greeks  also  were  a  chosen  people  —  chosen  to  develop  the 
idea  of  beauty,  as  the  Jews  that  of  religion.  Their  mission 
was  beauty  in  art  and  in  literature.  It  Avas  no  accident  that 
they  came  as  they  did  from  confluent  races,  flowing  together 
from  India  and  Phoenicia,  and  settling  in  that  sweet  climate 
and  romantic  land,  where  the  lovely  -35gean,  tossing  its  soft 
blue  waters  on  the  resounding  shore,  tempted  them  to  navi- 
gation, and  awakened  their  intellect  by  the  sight  of  many 
lands.  There  they  did  their  work.  They  made  their  calling 
and  election  sure.  Greek  architecture  —  one  birth  of  beauty 
after  another  —  was  born.  Athens  was  crowned  with  marvel- 
lous temples,  whose  exquisite  proportions  amaze  and  charm  us 
to-day  —  inimitable  creations  of  beauty.  Homer  came,  and 
then  epic  poetry  was  born,  -^schylus  and  tragedy  came  ; 
Pindar  and  the  lyric  song  ;  Theophrastus  and  pastoral  music  ; 
Anacreon  and  the  strain  which  bears  his  special  name.  And 
80  Phidias  and  his  companions  created  sculpture,  Herodotus 
history,  Demosthenes  oratory,  Plato  and  Aristotle  philoso- 
phy, Zeuxis  painting,  and  Pericles  statesmanship.  This  was 
their  election,  and  they  made  it  sure. 

The  Romans  also  had  their  chosen  work.  They  were 
elected  to  develop  the  idea  of  law.  A  prosaic  people, 
but  filled  with  notions  of  justice,  they  developed  jurispru- 
dence. To  show  that  a  nation  can  be  governed  not  by  des- 
potic will,  nor  by  popular  will,  but  by  law,  —  this  was  the 
office  of  Rome.  As  long  as  it  did  this  work  it  prospered  ; 
when  it  ceased  to  do  it,  it  fell.  All  other  races,  no  doubt, 
have  their  special  calling  too.  Some  make  it  sure  ;  others 
eeem  to  fail  of  making  it  sure,  and  so  disappear.     Thus  the 


CALLING,    ELECTION,    AND    REPROBATION.  279 

election  of  the  Jews  shows  a  principle  of  God's  government, 
and  is  not  an  exceptional  case. 

That  which  is  true  of  nations  and  races  is  also  true  of 
religions  and  of  Chrit^tiau  denominations.  All  Christians 
are  a  chosen  people.  They  are  chosen  for  the  work  of 
teaching  to  the  human  race  the  great  doctrines  of  the  father- 
hood of  God  and  the  brotherhood  of  man.  Other  religions 
were  sent  to  men.  too.  Mohammed  had  his  mission  —  to 
convert  the  idolatrous  Arabs  to  Monotheism.  The  religions 
of  Asia  were  intended  to  prepare  the  way  for  Christianity 
by  teaching  the  elementary  ideas  of  religion  and  morality. 

§  7.  How  different  Denominations  are  elected.  —  Every 
great  denomination,  and  small  ones,  too,  are  chosen  to  un- 
fold some  one  Christian  idea.  The  Catholic  Church  was 
chosen  to  carry  forward  the  great  central  idea  of  unity  — 
one  Lord,  one  faith,  one  baptism.  But  the  Catholic  Church 
is  not  catholic  enough :  it  has  turned  itself  into  a  sect  by 
excluding  those  who  could  not  accept  all  its  statements  and 
methods,  though  they  accepted  Christ.  The  Jewish  Church 
committed  the  same  mistake.  When  it  became  narrow, 
bigoted,  exclusive,  it  left  its  first  love  ;  it  then  ceased  to 
enlarge  itself,  and  was  obliged  to  disappear.  The  Jewish 
religion,  and  all  positive  religious,  are  like  vases  in  which  a 
plant  is  growing.  While  the  plants  are  young,  they  hold 
them  easily  ;  but  as  the  plants  grow,  the  vases,  incapable  of 
expansion,  are  shivered  by  the  enlarging  roots.  So  that, 
unless  the  Roman  Catholic  Church  can  be  liberalized  and 
enlarged,  it  must  break  to  pieces. 

W^hatever  is  said  of  Jews  as  the  chosen  and  elect  people 
is  intended  to  show  us  a  pi'inciple  which  must  be  applied  to 
others.  It  is  a  principle  very  visible  in  their  case,  but  not 
confined  to  them.  It  is  the  law  of  divine  Providence.  By 
what  we  see  of  its  working  in  their  case,  we  are  able  to  see 
it  in  other  cases,  where  it  is  less  distinct  and  less  apparent. 

§   8.     How    Individuals    are    elected.  —  And    now    let    us 


280     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

apply  the  doctrine  of  election  to  individuals.  When  one  id 
elected  he  is  always  elected  to  some  special  opportunity, 
which  he  can  improve  or  not,  and  for  vv^hich  he  is  held 
accountable. 

When  God  sends  into  the  world  a  great  and  original 
genius,  like  Columbus,  Sir  Isaac  Newton,  Dante,  Shake- 
speare, Mozart,  Michael  Angelo,  Franklin,  Washington,  By- 
ron, Napoleon,  it  is  very  plain  that  they  are  sent,  provided 
with  certain  qualities,  to  do  a  certain  work.  It  is  evident 
that  God  meant  Columbus  to  discover  America,  and  Dante 
to  write  a  poem.  If  Columbus  had  tried  to  write  the  "  In- 
ferno," and  Dante  had  devoted  himself  to  inventing  a  steam- 
engine,  if  Franklin  had  written  sonnets  and  pastorals,  and 
Isaac  Newton  had  gone  into  trade,  if  Washington  had 
composed  symphonies,  and  Beethoven  had  travelled  to  dis- 
cover the  source  of  the  Nile,  they  would  not  have  made 
their  calling  and  election  sure.  But  such  men  (with  an  oc- 
casional exception,  like  that  of  Napoleon  and  Byron)  were 
all  faithful  to  their  own  inspiration,  and  each  chose  to  abide 
in  the  calling  in  which  he  was  called ;  and  so  each  did 
the  work  God  gave  him  to  do  in  the  world.  Napoleon 
and  Byron  did  their  work  only  partially,  for  they  allowed 
their  egotism  to  blind  them,  so  as  to  lose  sight  of  their  mis- 
sion after  a  while.  God  sent  Napoleon  to  bind  together  and 
organize  the  institutions  of  a  new  time  —  to  organize  liberty. 
He  did  it  for  a  season,  and  then  sought,  egotistically,  only  to 
build  up  himself  and  his  dynasty ;  then  his  work  came  to  a 
sudden  end.  For  it  is  vanity  and  egotism  which  make  us 
fail.  We  wish  for  some  calling  finer  or  nobler  than  the 
calling  God  gives  us ;    so  we  come  to  nothing. 

In  these  great  and  shining  examples  we  are  taught  how 
God  elects  men,  how  he  elects  all  men,  and  how  he  elects 
all  to  work.  These  are  not  the  exceptional  cases,  as  we  are 
apt  to  suppose,  but  they  are  the  illustrations  of  a  yniversal 
rule. 


CALLING,    lOLKCTION,    AND    RKPROBATION.  281 

Every  human  bciu^  lias  his  owu  gilt  and  opportunity  I'loin 
God ;  some  after  this  fashion,  and  others  after  that.  If 
faitliful,  he  can  see  what  it  is.  If  his  eye  is  single,  his 
whole  body  is  full  of  light.  If  he  is  true  to  the  light  within 
his  soul,  it  grows  more  and  more  clear  to  him  what  God 
wants  him  to  do.  Not  every  man's  business  is  to  do  great 
works  in  the  world ;  but  every  one  is  sent  to  do  something 
and  to  be  something  —  something  which  shall  bring  him 
nearer  to  God  —  something  which  shall  make  him  more  use- 
ful to  man.  At  first  he  is  confused  ;  he  cannot  tell  what  his 
calling  is.  But  each  day,  if  he  be  faithful  to  each  day's 
call,  causes  the  whole  calling  of  his  life  to  become  more 
luminous  and  clear.  So  we  see  that  conscientious  and  faith- 
ful people,  as  they  continue  to  live,  grow  more  and  more 
into  specialty  of  work,  and  have  more  and  more  of  a  special 
place  and  duty.  Thus  we  see  that  all  God's  callings  are 
special,  and  none  vague  or  general.  "•  Every  man  has  his 
proper  gift  from  the  Lord  ;  one  after  this  fashion,  and  another 
after  that."  Perhaps  it  is  not  a  shining  gift,  it  will  not  make 
him  famous,  but  it  is  always  a  good  one  —  always  useful  and 
noble.  K  we  follow  God's  leadings,  we.  shall  always  come 
out  right.  "  Let  every  man,"  says  the  apostle,  "  abide  in 
the  calling  in  Avhich  he  is  called."  Let  him  not  be  impatient 
of  his  own  gift,  nor  covetous  of  another's ;  let  him  not  be 
uneasy  in  his  place,  nor  straining  for  something  beyond  his 
reach.  But  if  faithful  every  day  to  his  own  gift,  he  may  be 
sure  that  it  will  grow  at  last  into  something  truly  good, 
satisfactory,  and  sufficient. 

§  9.  How  Jesus  was  elected  to  he  the  Christ.  — Perhaps  we 
can  now  better  understand  how  Christ  was  "  the  chosen  one 
of  God."  If  Columbus  was  chosen  and  sent  to  discover  a 
Avorld,  if  Dante  was  sent  to  be  a  great  poet,  if  Mozart, 
Rafaelle,  had  each  his  mission,  can  we  doubt  that  Jesus  also 
was  specially  selected  and  endowed  for  the  work  which  he 
has  actually  done,  to  be  the  leader  of  the  Human  race  in 
24* 


282      ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

religion  and  goodness  —  to  lead  it  up  to  God?  Yet  those 
who  will  admit  the  mission  in  all  other  cases,  question  it  in 
his  case.  But  what  was  true  in  them  was  much  more  so  in 
him.  He  was  conscious  from  the  first  that  he  was  selected. 
"  Wist  ye  not  that  I  must  be  about  my  Father's  business?" 
"  To  this  end  I  was  born,  that  I  might  bear  witness  to  the 
ti'uth."  "  God  sent  not  his  Son  into  the  world  to  condemn 
the  world,  but  that  the  Avorld,  through  him,  might  be  saved." 
"  For  this  cause  came  I  to  this  hour."  "  I  have  finished 
the  work  given  me  to  do." 

Jesus,  by  his  nature  and  organization,  by  his  education, 
by  the  very  time  of  his  birth,  by  the  inspiration  and  influence 
of  the  Holy  Spirit,  was  elected  and  called.  And  he  fulfilled 
his  part  perfectly  ;  and  so,  the  two  conditions  being  met,  he 
became  Saviour  of  the  world,  and  perpetual  Ruler  of  the 
moral  and  spiritual  nature  of  man. 

§  10.  Other  Illustrations  of  Individuul  Calling  and  -Elec- 
tion. —  But  it  is  not  merely  great  men,  and  men  of  genius, 
who  are  thus  providentially  chosen  and  sent.  Every  man  is 
chosen  for  something,  and  that  something  not  vague  and 
general,  but  special  and  distinct. 

You  go  into  some  country  village  of  New  England.  You 
find  there  some  plain  farmer,  of  no  great  education,  perhaps, 
but  endowed  with  admirable  insight  and  sagacity,  and  of  a 
kind  and  benevolent  nature.  He  has  come  to  be  the  coun- 
sellor and  adviser  of  the  whole  community.  He  has  no  title  ; 
he  is  not  even  a  "  squire."  He  has  no  office  ;  he  is  not  even 
a  justice  of  the  peace.  But  he  fulfils  the  mission  of  peace- 
maker and  of  sagacious  counsellor.  He  is  judge  without  a 
seat  on  the  bench  ;  he  is  spiritual  guide  without  being  called 
"  reverend  ;  "  he  is  the  stay,  the  centre,  the  most  essential  per- 
son in  the  place.  He  has  had  an  evident  calling  from  God, 
not  from  man,  and  he  has  made  it  sure  by  his  diligence  and 
fidelity  in  his  work. 

And  perhaps  in  the  same  village  is  a  woman,  poor,  old, 


CALLING,    KLECTION,    AND    UKFROBATION.  283 

aud  uneducated.  But  ^he,  too,  has  a  calling  tVoni  God. 
She  is  always  sent  for  in  the  hour  of  trial.  If  any  accident 
happens,  she  is  there.  Her  sagacity  aud  experieucc  help 
her  to  do  what  is  needed.  She  has  no  medical  diploma,  but 
she  is  the  good  physician  of  the  place.  God  gave  to  her 
native  sagacity,  gave  to  her  benevolence,  gave  her  acute 
observation  aud  a  good  memory,  and  she  has  made  her  elec- 
tion sure  by  her  own  tidellty. 

Some  persons  are  called  to  love  and  teach  little  children : 
that  is  their  work.  They  arc  happy  with  children,  and  chil- 
dren are  happy  with  them.  Some  are  called  to  sympathize ; 
their  natures  overflow  with  sympathy;  they  enter  readily 
into  all  trials  and  into  the  troubles  of  every  soul,  and  they 
pour  oil  aud  wine  into  the  wounds  of  the  heart.  God  called 
them  to  be  his  good  Samaritans,  and  they  hear  the  call  and 
obey. 

"  A  place  for  everything,  and  everything  in  its  place," 
says  the  prudent  housekeeper.  "  A  place  for  every  man, 
and  every  man  in  his  place,"  says  the  divine  Housekeeper, 
who  has  so  many  mansions  in  his  house,  and  whose  Son 
said  he  went  to  prepare  a  place  for  us  there  in  the  other 
world  —  a  working  place,  probably,  and  a  sphere  of  labor 
there  as  here.  But  in  this  world,  too,  what  a  delight  it  is  to 
see  any  one  in  his  right  place ! 

There  are  diflferent  ways  in  which  God  calls  us,  and  dilFer- 
eui.  kinds  of  callings.  But  every  calling  of  God  is  good  and 
noble.  He  calls  us  to  work  ;  he  calls  us  to  Christian  good- 
ness ;  he  calls  us  to  heavenly  joy,  to  glory,  honor,  aud 
immortality.  These  are  the  three  great  callings  of  man  — 
Christian  work  first.  Christian  goodness  next.  Christian 
glory  last.  Since  God  made  every  one  of  us,  he  made  eveiy 
one  of  us  for  something  ;  he  has  appointed  a  destiny  for  each 
one,  and  he  calls  us  to  it.  If  we  do  not  hear  the  gentle  call, 
the  whisper  of  his  grace,  he  calls  us  by  trial,  by  disaster,  by 
disappointment.     He  chastens  us  for  our  profit.     He  prunes 


284     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

our  too  luxuriant  branches  that  we  may  bring  forth  more 
fruit. 

So  tliis  doctrine  of  election,  in  its  other  form,  as  usually 
taught  by  Orthodoxy,  so  harsh  and  terrible,  —  "  horribile 
decretum," — so  dishonorable  to  God,  so  destructive  to  mo- 
rality, so  palsying  to  effort,  grows  lovely  and  encouraging 
when  looked  at  aright. 

As  one  grows  old,  and  looks  back  over  his  past  life,  he 
sees  the  working  of  this  divine  decree  —  working  where  he 
concurred  with  it,  working  where  he  resisted  it.  He  sees 
more  and  more  clearly  what  his  election  was,  and  how  he 
has  fulfilled  it,  how  far  failed.  He  sees  himself  as  a  youth, 
fiery  and  ardent,  striving  for  one  thing,  educated  by  God 
for  another.  He  sees  how  he  was  partly  led  and  partly 
driven  into  his  true  work ;  how  he  has  been  made  an  instru- 
ment by  God  for  good  he  never  dreamed  of  to  God's 
other  children.  He  says,  "  It  is  no  doing  of  mine.  It 
is  the  Lord's  doing.  He  chose  me  for  it  before  the  foun- 
dation of  the  world.  I  builded  better  than  I  knew.  I  have 
failed  in  a  thousand  plans  of  my  own,  but  I  have  iguorantly 
fulfilled  God's  plans.  I  am  like  Saul,  the  son  of  Ivish, 
who  went  out  to  seek  his  father's  asses,  and  found  a  king- 
dom. I  am  like  Scihiller's  explorer,  who  went  to  sea  with 
a  thousand  vessels,  and  came  to  shore  saved  in  a  single 
boat,  yet  having  in  that  boat  the  best  result  of  the  whole 
voyage." 


IMMORTALITY   AND   THE   RESURRECTION.  285 


CHAPTER    XII. 

IMMORTALITY  AND  THE  RESURRECTION. 

§  1.  Orthodox  Doctrine.  —  The  Orthodox  doctrine  of  the 
future  life  is  thus  stated  in  the  Assembly's  Catechism,  chapter 
32:  — 

"  I.  The  bodies  of  men,  after  death,  return  to  dust,  and 
see  corruption  ;  but  their  souls  (which  neither  die  nor  sleep) 
having  an  immortal  subsistence,  immediately  return  to  God 
who  gave  them.  The  souls  of  the  righteous,  being  then 
made  perfect  in  holiness,  are  received  into  the  highest  heav- 
ens, where  they  behold  the  face  of  God,  in  light  and  glory, 
waiting  for  the  full  redemption  of  their  bodies.  And  the 
souls  of  the  wicked  are  cast  into  hell,  where  they  remain  in 
torments  and  utter  darkness,  reserved  to  the  judgment  of  the 
great  day.  Besides  these  two  places  for  souls  separated 
from  their  bodies,  the  Scripture  acknowledgeth  none. 

"  II.  At  the  last  day,  such  as  are  found  alive  shall  not 
die,  but  be  changed ;  and  all  the  dead  shall  be  raised  up 
with  the  selfsame  bodies,  and  none  other,  although  with 
different  qualities,  which  shall  be  united  again  with  their 
souls  forever. 

"  III.  The  bodies  of  the  unjust  shall,  by  the  power  of 
Christ,  be  raised  to  dishonor ;  the  bodies  of  the  just  by  his 
Spirit  unto  honor,  and  be  made  conformable  to  his  own  glori- 
ous body." 

The  views  here  given  may  be  considered,  on  the  whole, 
the  Orthodox  notions  on  this  subject,  although  Orthodoxy  is 
by  no  means  rigorous  on  these  points.  Considerable  diver- 
sity of  opinion  is  here  allowed.     The  nature  of  the    lifo 


286     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

between  death  and  the  resurrection,  and  the  nature  of  the 
resurrection  body,  are  differently  apprehended,  without  any 
discredit  to  the  Orthodoxy  of  the  belief.  But,  on  the  whole, 
we  may  say  that  the  Orthodox  views  on  these  topics  include 
the  following  heads  :  — 

1.  Man  consists  of  soul  and  body. 

2.  The  soul  of  man  is  naturally  immortal. 

3.  The  only  satisfactory  proof  of  this  immortality  is  the 
resurrection  of  Christ. 

4.  Christ's  resurrection  consisted  in  his  return  to  earth  in 
the  same  body  as  that  with  which  he  died,  though  glorified. 

5.  Our  resurrection  will  consist  in  our  taking  again  the 
same  bodies  which  we  have  now,  glorified  if  we  are  Chris- 
tians, but  degraded  if  we  are  not. 

On  the  other  hand,  those  views  which  incline  towards 
rationalism  and  spiritualism  agree  in  part  with  these  state- 
ments, and  in  part  differ  ;  thus  :  — 

1.  They  usually  agree  with  Orthodoxy  in  believing  man 
to  consist  of  soul  and  body. 

2.  They  also  agree  in  believing  the  soul  of  man  naturally 
immortal. 

3.  They  differ  from  Orthodoxy  in  thinking  the  proof  of 
immortality  to  be  found  in  human  consciousness,  not  at  all 
in  the  resurrection  of  Jesus. 

We  will  therefore  examine  these  two  points  of  immortality 
and  the  resurrection,  to  see  what  the  true  doctrine  of  Scrip- 
ture is  concerning  them. 

§  2.  The  Doctrine  of  Immortality  as  taught  by  Beason,  the 
Instinctive  Consciousness,  and  Scripture.  —  The  first  class  of 
proofs  usually  adduced  for  immortality  are  the  rational 
proofs,  which  are  such  as  these  :  — 

The  Metaphysical  Proof.  —  This  is  based  on  the  dis- 
tinction of  soul  and  body.  The  existence  of  the  soul  is 
proved  exactly  as  we  prove  the  existence  of  the  body.     If 


IMMORTALITY    AND   THE   RESURRECTION.  287 

we  can  prove  the  one,  we  can  equally  prove  the  other.  If 
any  one  asks,  How  do  we  know  there  is  such  a  thing  as 
body  ?  we  reply  that  we  know  it  by  the  senses  ;  we  can 
touch,  taste,  smell,  and  see  it.  But  to  this  the  answer  is, 
that  the  senses  only  give  us  sensations,  and  that  these  sensa- 
tions are  in  the  miud,  not  out  of  it.  We  have  a  sensation 
of  resistance,  of  color,  of  perfume,  and  the  like  ;  but  how 
do  we  know  that  there  is  anything  outside  of  the  mind  cor- 
responding to  them  ?  The  answer  to  this  is,  that  by  a  neces- 
sary law  of  the  reason,  when  we  have  a  sensation,  we  infer 
some  external  substance  from  which  it  proceeds.  We  look 
at  a  book,  for  example.  We  have  a  sensation  of  shape 
and  color  ;  we  infer  something  outside  of  our  mind  from 
which  it  proceeds.  In  other  words,  we  perceive  qualities 
and  infer  substance.  This  inference  is  a  spontaneous  and 
inevitable  act  of  the  mind.  Now,  we  are  conscious  of 
another  group  of  feelings  which  are  not  sensations,  which  do 
not  come  from  without,  but  from  within.  These  are  mental 
and  moral.  But  they,  too,  are  qualities  ;  and,  as  in  the  other 
case,  perceiving  qualities,  we  infer  a  substance  in  which  they 
inhere.  This  latter  substance  we  name  soul,  and  we  know 
it  exactly  as  we  know  body.  It  is  known  by  lis  as  a  simple 
substance,  having  personal  unity.  The  personality,  the  "  I," 
is  a  fundamental  idea.  Now,  as  soon  as  we  perceive  the 
existence  of  soul,  it  becomes  evident  that  soul  cannot  die. 
It  may  be  annihilated,  but  it  cannot  die.  For  what  is  death 
when  applied  to  the  body?  Dissolution  or  separation  of  the 
parts,  but  not  destruction  of  the  simple  elements.  Death  is 
decomposition  of  these  elements,  and  their  resolution  into 
new  combinations.  Now,  the  soul,  being  known  by  us  as  a 
simple  substance,  is  incapable  of  dissolution. 

This  is  the  metaphysical  proof  of  immortality.  Then  comes 
the  TELEOLOGic  proof,  or  that  from  final  causes.  Man's 
end  is  not  reached  in  this  life.  We  see  everything  in  this 
world  made  for  an  end.     The  body  is  made  for  an  end,  and 


288  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

attains  it,  and  then  decays  and  is  dissolved.  The  soul,  with 
all  its  great  powers,  goes  on  and  on,  but  the  body  dies  before 
the  soul  is  ever  perfected.  Eveiy  human  life  is  like  an  un- 
finished tale  in  a  magazine,  with  "to  be  continued"  Avritten 
at  its  close,  to  show  that  it  is  not  yet  ended. 

And  besides  these  proofs  of  immortality,  there  is  the 
THEOLOGICAL  proof,  founded  on  the  attributes  of  God  ;  and 
(he  MOKAL  proof,  based  on  the  conflict  between  conscience 
and  self-love  ;  and  the  analogical  proof,  based  on  the  law 
of  progress  in  nature  ;  and  the  cosmic  proof,  founded  on  the 
relation  of  the  soul  to  the  universe ;  and  the  historic  proof, 
resting  on  the  universal  belief  in  immortality  ;  and  lastly,  the 
psychologic  proof,  or  the  instinct  of  life  in  man,  which  car- 
ries with  it  its  own  evidence  of  continuity. 

But  after  all  these  proofs  have  been  considered,  the  final 
result  is  probability.  Only  the  last  gives  more,  and  this  acts 
not  as  an  argument,  but  as  conviction.  And  the  strength  of 
this  conviction  depends  on  the  strength  in  any  individual  of 
this  instinct.  Some  have  more  of  the  instinct  of  life,  others 
less.*  Those  who  have  much  are  easily  convinced  by  these 
various  arguments.  But  those  who  have  less,  feel  as  Cicero 
did  after  reading  the  Phsedo  of  Plato,  f 

This  instinct  of  life  appears  not  only  to  be  different  from 
the  fear  of  death,  but  its  exact  opposite.  When  we  have 
most  of  the  one,  we  have  the  least  of  the  other.     Any  great 

*  a  person  who  never  had  an  intellectual  doubt  concernmg  a  future  life  may 
be  BO  poorly  provided  with  an  inward  sense  of  immortality  that  he  may  never 
feel  quite  willing  to  die,  or  confident  in  view  of  death.  Such  a  man  was  Dr. 
Johnson,  who  had  not  the  least  scepticism ;  who  was  a  dogmatic  believer,  and 
hated  a  heretic;  who,  yet,  never  attained  to  any  sort  of  comfort  in  view  of 
death,  and  was  .ilways  afraid  to  die.  So  there  may  be  another  person  who 
may  have  no  intellectual  belief  in  a  future  life,  but  who  will  have  the  instinct 
of  immortality  so  strong  as  to  be  quite  easy  and  happy  in  looking  forward  to 
death.  Such  a  person  is  Miss  Martineau,  who,  in  consequence  of  a  poor  phi- 
losophy oi materialism  which  she  was  taught  in  her  childhood,  and  has  always 
held,  has  been  brought  very  logically  at  last  to  disbelieve  immortality,  and  even 
the  existence  of  God,  and  yet  is  very  contented  about  it,  and  quite  happy. 

t  "  Nescio,  quomodo,  dum  lego,  assentior;  cum  posui  librum,  et  mecum  ipso 
de  immortalitate  anlmorum  ccepi  cogitare,  assensio  omuis  ilia  illabitur." 


IMMORTALITY    AND   THE   RESURRECTION.  289 

excitement  lifts  us  temporarily  above  the  fear  of  death  by 
giving  us  more  life.  So  a  man  will  plunge  into  the  sea,  and 
risk  his  own  life  to  save  that  of  another.  So  whole  armies 
go  to  die  cheerfully  in  the  great  rage  of  battle.  But  this 
instinct  receives  a  permanent  strength  by  all  that  elevates 
the  soul.  All  greatness  of  aim,  all  devotion  to  duty,  all 
generous  love,  take  away  the  fear  of  death  by  adding  to  the 
quantum  of  life  in  the  soul.* 

If  it  be  asked  what  the  Scriptures  teach  concerning  im- 
mortality, it  must  be  admitted  that  they  have  not  much  to 
say.  They  speak  of  life  and  of  eternal  life  ;  but  this,  as  we 
shall  discover,  is  quite  another  thing  from  continued  exist- 
ence. It  refers  to  the  quality  and  quantity  of  being,  and  not 
merely  to  its  duration. 

§3.  The  Three  Principal  Views  of  Death  —  the  Pagaii, 
Jewish^  and  Chrisfiayi.  —  There  are  three  principal  views  of 
death  —  the  Pagan  view,  the  Jewish  view,  and  the  Christian 
view. 

Paganism,  in  all  its  various  forms,  is  chiefly  distinguished 
by  its  transferring  to  the  other  life  the  tastes,  feelings,  habits 
of  this  life.  The  other  world  is  this  one,  shaded  off  and 
toned  down.  It  is  gray  in  its  hue,  wanting  the  color  of  this 
world  ;  and  is  really  inferior  to  it,  and  only  its  pale  reflection. 
To  the  gods  of  Olympus  the  doings  of  men  are  matters  of 
chief  interest.    Tartarus  and  the  Elysian  Fields  are  occupied 


*  Thus  it  is  said,  "  In  Christ  shall  all  be  made  alive."  The  meaning'  is,  that 
■when  we  live  in  reference  to  God,  to  immortal  truth,  to  the  infinite  law  of 
right,  —  when  we  really  love  anything  out  of  ourselves,  —  we  lose  all  fear  of 
death.  "Perfect  love  casts  out  fear;"  that  is,  pure  love.  The  love  of  a 
mother  for  a  child  casts  out  fear.  She  is  not  afraid  of  death ;  she  will  run  the 
risk  of  death  twenty  times  over  to  save  her  child.  The  immortal  element 
18  aroused  in  her.  The  soldier  is  roused  by  the  general's  fiery  speech  to  a 
thrill  of  patriotism,  and  thinks  it  sweet  and  beautiful  to  die  for  his  country. 
Love  of  his  country  has  oast  out  his  fear.  This  is  something  more  than  any 
mere  insensibility.  Men  can  harden  themselves  against  danger  and  death ; 
they  can  think  of  something  else.  But  that  insensibility  is  merely  a  thick 
shell  put  round  it  —  a  sevenfold  shield  perhaps ;  but  the  mortal  fear  lies  hidden 
all  the  same  within.    True  life  is  very  difi'erent. 

25 


290    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

by  lymphatic  ghosts,  misty  spectres,  unsubstantial  and  unoc- 
cupied. When  a  living  man  enters,  like  Ulysses,  ^neas,  or 
Dante,  they  throng  around  him,  delighted  to  have  something 
in  which  they  can  take  a  real  interest,  "  Better  be  a  plough- 
boy  on  earth  than  a  king  among  the  ghosts."  This  expresses 
the  Pagan  idea  of  the  other  world.  This  world  is  more  real 
than  the  other,  to  the  Pagan. 

Judaism,  in  its  view  of  hereafter,  is  much  more  positive. 
It  began  with  no  idea  of  a  hereafter.  Nothing  is  taught 
concerning  a  future  life  by  Moses,  and  little  is  to  be 
found  concerning  it  even  in  the  prophets.  The  explana- 
tion is  simple.  Men  hard  at  work  in  the  present  do  not 
think  much  of  the  future ;  and  the  work  of  the  Jews 
was  to  be  servants  of  Jehovah  and  doers  of  his  law 
here.  However,  all  men  must  think  a  little  of  the  region 
beyond  death.  When  the  Jews  thought  of  it,  they  pro- 
jected their  law  upon  its  blank  .spaces.  It  was  a  place 
where  Jehovah  would  vindicate  his  law  —  where  the  just 
should  be  happy,  the  unjust  miserable.  The  perplexity 
which  tormented  Job,  David,  and  Elijah  —  namely,  that  bad 
men  should  succeed  in  this  world  and  good  men  fail  —  was 
to  find  its  solution  there.  Judgment  was  the  Jewish  idea  of 
hereafter  —  a  judgment  to  come.  "  I  have  a  hope  toward 
God,  as  they  themselves  also  allow,"  said  Paul,  speaking  of 
the  Pharisees,  "  that  there  shall  be  a  resurrection  of  the 
dead,  of  the  just,  and  also  of  the  unjust." 

The  Christian  view  of  death  is,  that  it  is  abolished  —  it 
has  ceased  to  be  anything.  The  New  Testament  distinctly 
says,  "  who  has  abolished  death,  and  brought  life  and  im- 
mortality to  light."  *  Death,  to  a  Christian,  is  but  a  point  on 
the  line  of  advancing  being  ;  a  door  through  which  we  pass  ; 


♦  The  word  here  rendered  abolished  is  elsewhere  translated  "  destroyed," 
"made  void,"  "made  of  none  effect,"  "brought  to  nothing,"  "vanished 
away,"  "  done  away,"  "  put  down."  The  meaning  is,  that  all  its  force,  im- 
portance, value,  is  taken  out  of  it. 


IMMORTALITY    AND    THE    RKSURRECTION.  2P I 

a  momentary  sleep  between  two  days.  In  the  same  sense 
the  Saviour  says,  "  He  that  liveth  and  believeth  on  me  shall 
never  die." 

So  also  he  spoke  of  Lazarus  as  being  only  asleep,  and  said 
of  the  daughter  of  Jairus,  "  She  is  not  dead,  but  sleepeth." 

Certainly  Jesus  could  not  have  spoken  of  death  in  this 
way  if  he  regarded  it  as  the  awful  and  solemn  thing  which 
n-iOi  believers  consider  it.  If  it  is  the  moment  that  de- 
cides our  eternal  destiny,  which  shuts  the  gate  of  probation, 
which  terminates  for  the  sinner  all  opportunity  of  repentance 
and  conversion,  for  the  saint  all  danger  of  relapse  and  fall,  — 
then  death  is  surely  something,  and  something  of  the  most 
immense  importance. 

But  Christ  has  really  destroyed  death  both  in  the  Pagan 
and  in  the  Jewish  feeling  concerning  it.  He  destroys  the 
Pagan  idea  of  death  as  a  plunge  downward  from  something 
into  nothing,  a  descent  into  non-entity  or  half-entity,  a  diminu- 
tion of  our  being,  a  passage  from  the  substantial  to  the 
shadowy  and  unreal. 

For,  according  to  Christianity,  we  do  not  descend  in  death  ; 
we  ascend  into  more  of  reality,  into  higher  life.  Death  is  a 
passage  onward  and  upward. 

The  proof  of  this  we  find  in  the  Christian  doctrine  of  the 
Resurrection. 

The  meaning  of  the  resurrection  of  Christ  is  not,  as  has 
been  often  supposed,  that  after  death  he  came  to  life  again, 
but  that  at  death  he  rose  ;  that  his  death  was  rising  up, 
ascent.  This  we  shall  show  in  a  future  section  of  this 
chapter. 

One  power  of  Christ's  resurrection  was  to  abolish  the  fear 
of  death.-  It  brought  life  and  immortality  to  light.  It 
showed  men  their  immortality. 

The  fear  of  death  is  natural  to  all  men,  but  it  h  easily 
removed.  The  smallest  and  lowest  power  of  the  resurrec- 
tion is  shown  in  removing  it. 


292    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

The  fear  of  death  is  natural.  It  consists  in  this  —  that 
we  ai-e,  in  a  great  pai't  of  our  nature,  immersed  in  the  finite 
and  perishing.  "  When  we  look  at  the  things  which  are 
seen,"  which  "  are  temporal,"  Ave  have  an  inward  feeling  of 
instability  —  nothing  substantial.  Therefore  it  is  said,  "In 
Adam  all  die,"  for  the  Adam,  the  first  man  in  all  of  us,  is  the 
animal  soul.  "  The  first  man  is  of  the  earth,  earthy."  The 
law  of  our  life  is,  that  it  comes  from  our  love.  When  we 
love  the  finite,  our  life  is  finite.  But  besides  the  finite  ele- 
ment in  man,  the  animal  soul,  or  Adam,  is  the  spiritual 
element,  or  Christ,  the  life  flowing  from  things  unseen,  but 
eternal. 

Christ  has  abolished  death.  There  is  now  to  the  Chris- 
tian no  such  thing  as  death,  in  the  common  sense  of  the 
term.  The  only  death  is  the  sense  of  death,  the  fear  of 
death,  which  insnares  and  enslaves.  Jesus  delivers  us 
from  this  by  inspiring  us  with  faith.  We  rise  with  him 
when  we  look  with  him  at  the  things  unseen.  Faith  in 
eternal  things  brings  into  the  soul  a  sense  of  eternity.  Death 
is  only  a  sleep  :  outward  death  is  the  sleep  of  the  bodily  life  ; 
inward  death  is  the  sleep  of  the  higher  life.  We  awake 
and  rise  from  the  dead  M'hen  Christ  gives  us  life ;  and 
when  he,  who  is  our  life,  shall  appear,  we  shall  also  appear 
with  him. 

The  philosopher  Lessing  says,  "  Thus  was  Christ  the  first 
practical  teacher  of  the  immortality  of  the  soul.  For  it  is 
one  thing  to  conjecture,  to  wish,  to  hope  for,  to  believe  in 
immortality  as  a  philosophical  speculation  —  another  thing 
to.  arrange  all  our  plans  and  purposes,  all  our  inward  und 
our  outward  life,  in  accordance  to  it." 

Jesus  also  destroys  the  Jewish  idea  of  death,  as  a  passage 
from  a  world  where  the  good  sufier  and  the  bad  triumph,  to 
a  world  "where  this  state  of  things  is  reversed.  The  kingdom 
of  heaven,  with  him,  begins  here,  in  this  world.  Judgment 
is  here  as  well  as  hereafter.     The  Jew  lived,  and  all  Judaiz- 


IMMORTALITY    AND   THE   RESURRECTION.  :293 

ing  Christians  live,  uuder  a  fearful  lookiug  for  of  judgmeut 
after  death.  The  Christian  sees  that  judgment  is  always 
taking  place  ;  that  Christ  is  always  judging  the  world  ;  that 
God's  moral  laws  and  their  retributions  are  not  kept  in  a 
state  of  suspense  till  we  die  —  that  they  operate  now  daily. 
The  Christian  knows  that  heaven  and  hell  are  both  here,  and 
he  expects  to  find  them  hereafter,  because  he  finds  them  here. 
He  believes  in  law,  but  not  in  law  only.  He  believes  in 
something  higher  than  law,  namely,  love  —  the  love  of  a 
present,  helpful  Father,  of  a  friend  near  at  hand,  of  an  inspi- 
ration from  on  high,  of  a  God  who  forgives  all  sins  when 
they  are  repented  of,  and  saves  all  who  trust  in  him.  He 
is  not  under  law,  but  under  grace. 

When  he  looks  forward  to  the  other  world,  it  is  not  as  to 
a  place  where  he  goes  to  be  sentenced  by  a  stern  and  abso- 
lute judge,  but  where  judgment  and  mercy  go  hand  in  hand, 
where  law  remains,  but  is  fulfilled  by  love. 

This  is  what  Paul  means  when  he  says,  "  The  sting  of 
death  is  sin,  and  the  strength  of  sin  is  the  law ;  but  thanks 
be  to  God,  w'ho  hath  given  us  the  victory  through  our  Lord 
Jesus  Christ." 

The  only  real  death  is  the  fear  of  death  —  the  Pagan  fear 
of  death,  which  is  a  dread  of  loss,  change,  degradation  of 
being,  to  follow  the  dissolution  of  the  body  ;  and  the  Jewish 
fear  of  death,  which  is  a  fearful  looking  for  of  judgment,  and 
the  sting  of  which  is  sin.  Christ  abolishes  both  of  these 
fears  in  every  believing  heart.  He  abolishes  them  in  two 
ways  —  by  the  life  and  the  resurrection.  He  is  both  resur- 
rection and  life  :  by  inspiring  us  with  spiritual  or  eternal  life, 
he  abolishes  all  fear  of  dissolution  ;  and  by  showing  us  that 
he  has  ascended  into  a  higher  state  by  his  resurrection,  he 
gives  us  the  belief  that  death  is  not  going  down,  but  going 
up.  For,  though  "  it  doth  not  yet  appear  what  we  shall  be, 
yet  we  know  this,  that  when  he  shall  appear,  we  shall  be 
Uke  him." 

25* 


294    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

But,  unfortunately,  Christians  are  still  subject  to  the  fear 
of  death.  This  fear  has  been  aggravated  by  the  current 
teaching  in  pulpits  professedly  Christian.  The  fear  of  that 
"  something  after  death ''  has  been  made  use  of  to  palsy  the 
will ;  and  conscience,  as  instructed  by  Christian  teachers, 
has  made  cowards  of  us  all ;  so  that  few  persons  can  really 
say,  "  Thanks  be  to  God,  who  has  given  us  the  victory 
through  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ." 

It  is  very  certain  that  the  Pagan  view  of  death  and  the 
Jewish  view  of  death  still  linger  in  the  Church,  and  are 
encouraged  by  Christian  teachers.  Death  is  made  terrible 
by  false  doctrine  and  false  teaching  in  the  Church.  Christ 
has  not  abolished  death  to  the  majority  of  Christians.  Chris- 
tians are  almost  as  much  afraid  of  death  as  the  heathen  — 
sometimes  more  so. 

Actual  Christianity  is  a  very  different  thing  from  ideal 
Christianity.  Ideal  Christianity  is  Christianity  as  seen 
and  lived  by  Jesus  ;  the  gospel  which  he  saw  and  spoke ; 
the  word  of  God  made  flesh  in  him.  But  actual  Christianity 
is  an  amalgam  ;  a  portion  of  real  Christianity  mixed  with  a 
portion  of  the  belief  and  habits  of  feeling  existing  in  men's 
minds  before  they  became  Christians.  The  Jews  took  a  large 
quantity  of  Judaism  into  Christianity  ;  the  Pagans  a  large 
quantity  of  Paganism.  The  Christian  Church  from  the  very 
beginning  Judaized  and  Paganized.  Paul  contended  against 
its  Judaism  on  the  one  baud  and  its  Paganism  on  the  other. 
But  Judaism  and  Paganism  have  always  stuck  to  the  Chris- 
tian Church.  She  has  never  risen  above  them  wholly  to  this 
day.  They  mingle  with  all  her  doctrines,  ceremonies,  and 
habits  of  life.  The  Romish  Church  has  more  of  the  Pagan 
element,  the  Protestant  more  of  the  Jewish.  The  media- 
torial system  of  Rome  is  essentially  Pagan.  Its  ascending 
series  of  deacons,  sub-deacons,  priests,  bishops,  archbishops, 
patriarchs,  cardinals,  and  pope  in  the  Church  below ;  and 
beatified  and  sanctified  spirits,  angels,  and  archangels  in  the 


IM.MOliTALlTY    AND    THE    llESUKRECTION.  295 

Church  above  ;  its  processious,  pili^riinages,  dresses,  its  mo- 
nastic institutions,  its  rosaries,  relics,  daily  sacrifice,  votive 
offerings  —  cverythiug  peculiar  to  the  Roman  Church,  existed 
before,  somewhere,  in  Paganism.  So  Protestantism  has 
taken  from  the  Jews  its  Sabbath,  its  idea  of  God  as  King  and 
Judge,  its  exclusion  from  God's  favor  of  all  but  the  elect,  its 
view  of  the  divine  sovereignty,  its  doctrine  of  predestination, 
day  of  judgment,  resurrection  of  the  body,  material  heaven 
and  material  hell. 

I  do  not  mean  to  say  that  there  is  no  truth  in  tliese  things. 
There  is,  because  there  is  some  truth  in  Paganism  and  in 
Judaism.  We  are  all  Pagans  and  Jews  before  we  become 
Christians.  The  Jewish  and  Pagan  element  is  in  every  hu- 
man soul,  and  in  all  constants  in  man  there  is  truth.  But 
the  Pagan  and  Jewish  truths  are  but  stepping-stones  to  the 
higher  Christian  truth.  The  law  and  Paganism  are  school- 
masters to  bring  us  to  Christ.  The  evil  is,  that  Christianity 
has  not  been  kept  supreme  ;  it  has  often  been  sunk  and  lost  in 
the  earlier  elements.  As  the  foolish  Galatians  were  bewitched, 
and  relapsed  from  the  gospel  to  the  law,  —  turning  again  to 
weak  and  beggarly  elements,  desiring  to  be  in  bondage  to 
them  again,  going  back  to  their  minority  under  tutors  and 
governors,  —  so  the  Church  has  been  relapsing,  going  back  to 
weak  and  beggarly  elements,  not  keeping  Christianity  su- 
preme in  thought,  heart,  and  life,  but  letting  Paganism  or 
Judaism  get  the  upper  hand. 

So  it  has  been  in  regard  to  this  subject.  We  Paganize 
and  Judaize  in  our  view  of  death.  We  reestablish  again 
what  Christ  has  abolished.  We  make  death  something  where 
Christ  made  it  nothing.  It  is  made  the  gi-eat  duty  of  life  to 
"  prepare  for  death."  No  such  duty  is  pointed  out  in  the 
New  Testament.  Our  duty  is  to  prepare  every  day  to  live; 
then,  w'heu  we  die,  we  shall  be  taken  care  of  by  God.  We 
can  safely  leave  the  other  world  and  its  interests  to  Him  who 
has  shown  himself  so  capable  of  taking  care  of  us  here. 


296    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

The  gloom  of  death  has  been  heightened  by  artificial 
means.  ■  Mourning  dresses,  solemn  faces,  funeral  addresses, 
the  grave,  —  all  have  had  an  unnatural  depth  of  awe  added 
to  the  natural  sense  of  bereavement.  The  Orthodox  Church 
has  deliberately  and  systematically  Paganized  and  Judaized 
in  what  it  has  said  and  done  about  death.  Its  object  has 
been  always  to  make  use  of  the  great  lever  of  fear  of  a  here- 
after in  order  to  enforce  Christian  belief  and  action.  Hence 
Death  has  been  made  the  king  of  terrors,  the  close  of  proba- 
tion, the  beginning  of  judgment,  the  awful  entrance  to  the 
final  decision  of  an  endless  doom.  All  this  is  wholly  unchris- 
tian, unknown  to  apostolic  times,  a  relapse  towards  Pa- 
ganism. It  is  utterly  opposed  to  the  great  declaration  that 
"  Christ  has  abolished  death,  and  brought  life  and 
immortality  to  light  through  the  gospel." 

What  is  called  faith  in  immortality,  therefore,  is  of  two 
kinds  :  it  is  an  instinct,  and  it  is  a  belief.  In  the  New  Tes- 
tament these  are  plainly  distinguished.  In  the  passage  just 
quoted,  it  is  said  that  Jesus  "  brought  life  and  immortality 
to  light."  Jesus  himself  says,  "  I  am  the  resurrection  and 
the  life."  "  He  that  believeth  in  me  hath  eternal  life  abid- 
ing in  him,  AND  I  will  raise  him  up  at  the  last  day." 

Life  is  a  matter  of  consciousness.  It  is  a  present  posses- 
sion, something  abiding  in  us  now. 

Immortality,  or  the  resurrection,  is  an  object  of  intellectual 
belief.  It  is  something  future.  We  feel  life  ;  we  believe  in 
the  resurrection. 

We  will  pass  on,  in  the  next  sections,  to  consider  each  of 
these. 

§  4.  Eternal  Life^  as  taught  in  the  New  Testament,  not 
endless  Future  Existence,  but  present  Spiritual  Life.  —  It  is 
only  necessary  carefully  to  examine  the  passages  in  the  New 
Testament  where  the  phrase  "eternal  life"  (i^wj  uiai'iog) 
occurs,  to  see  that  it  does  not  refer  to  the  duration,  but  to  the 
quality,  of  existence.      Temporal  life  is  that  life  of  the  soul 


IMMORTALITY    AND   THE    RESURRECTION.  207 

which  through  the  bod}'  is  subject  to  the  vicissitudes  of 
time.  Eternal  (or  cvcrhistiug)  life  is  that  life  of  the  spirit 
which  is  independent  of  change,  and  is  apart  from  duration. 
God's  being  was  regarded  by  the  Semitic  races  as  outside 
of  time  and  space,  as  a  perpetual  Now,  without  before  or 
after.  ("  I  am  the  I  Am."  Exod.  3  :  14.)  Man,  made  in 
the  image  of  God,  becomes  a  "  partaker  of  the  divine  na- 
ture "  (2  Peter  2  : 4)  by  the  gift  of  eternal  life. 

That  "  eternal  life  "  is  not  an  endless  temporal  existence 
appears,  — 

(a.)  From  the  passages  in  which  it  is  spoken  of  as  some- 
thing to  be  obtained  by  one's  own  efforts,  as  (Matt.  19  :  16) 
when  the  young  man  asks  of  Jesus  what  good  thing  he  shall 
do  that  he  may  have  eternal  life,  and  Jesus  replies  that  he 
must  keep  the  commandments,  give  his  possessions  to  the 
poor,  and  come  and  follow  him.  Certainly  that  was  not  the 
method  to  obtain  an  endless  existence,  but  it  was  the  true 
preparation  for  receiving  spiritual  good.  So  Jesus  tells 
Peter  (Mark  10  :  30)  that  those  who  make  sacrifices  for  the 
sake  of  truth  shall  receive  temporal  rewards  "  in  this  time  ;  " 
and  "in  the  coming  age  eternal  life"  ("■  eV  raJ  hi.u)Vk  tcJ 
ig/ofiipo)  ^wii'jv  aldpiop").  The  coming  age  is  the  age  of 
the  Messiah,  when  the  gift  of  the  Holy  Ghost  should  be 
bestowed. 

(6.)  Passages  in  which  eternal  life  is  spoken  of  as  a 
present  possession,  not  a  future  expectation.  (John  3  :  36.) 
"  He  that  believeth  on  the  Son  hath  (e/et)  eternal  life."  So 
John  6  :  47,  54,  &o. 

(c.)  Passages  in  which  eternal  life  is  defined  expressly  as 
a  state  of  the  soul.  (John  17:  3.)  "  This  is  life  eternal,  that 
they  may  know  thee  the  only  true  God,  and  Jesus  Christ 
whom  thou  hast  sent,"  &c. 

So  (Gal.  6:8)  it  is  represented  as  the  natural  result  of 
"  sowing  to  the  Spirit ;  "  (Rom.  2:7)  of  "  patient  continu- 


298    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

ance  in  well-doing  ;  "  as  "  the  gift  of  God  "  (Rom.  6  :  23)  ;  as 
something  which  we  "  lay  hold  of"  (1  Tim.  6  :  12,  19). 

This  view  of  "  eternal  life  "  is  taken  by  all  the  best  critics. 
Professor  Hovey  thus  sums  up  their  testimony  :  —  * 

"  On  a  certain  occasion,  Christ  pronounced  it  necessary  for 
the  Son  of  Man  to  be  lifted  up,  '  that  whosoever  believeth 
in  him  should  not  perish,  but  have  eternal  life '  (John  3  :  15)  — 
ixjl  SwTJj'  atwpiov.  Zm^iv  ulihi'iov,  says  Meyer,  who  is,  perhaps, 
the  best  commentator  on  the  New  Testament,  of  modern 
times,  '  signifies  the  eternal  Messianic  life,  which,  however, 
the  believer  already  possesses  —  £;/■>;  —  in  this  wioji',  that  is, 
in  the  temporal  development  of  that  moral  and  blessed  life 
which  is  independent  of  death,  and  which  will  culminate  in 
perfection  and  glory  at  the  coming  of  Christ.'  And  Liicke, 
whose  commentary  on  the  Gospel  of  John  is  one  of  the  most 
thorough  and  attractive  in  the  German  language,  says  that 
the  Qafi  aldviog,  which  is  the  exact  opposite  of  umoXeiu  (de- 
struction), or  d-divarog  (death),  is  the  sum  of  Messianic 
blessedness.  It  is  plain,  we  think,  that  the  life  here  spoken 
of  as  the  present  possession  of  every  believer  in  Christ  is 
more  than  endless  existence  ;  it  is  life  in  the  fullest  and  high- 
est sense  of  the  word,  the  free,  holy,  and  blessed  action  of  the 
whole  man,  that  is  to  say,  the  proper,  normal  living  of  a 
rational  and  moral  being.  The  germ,  the  principle  of  this 
life,  exists  in  the  heart  of  every  believer ;  it  is  a  present  pos- 
session. '  Whosoever,'  says  Christ,  '  drinketh  of  the  water 
that  I  shall  give  him  shall  never  thirst ;  but  the  water  that  I 
shall  give  him  shall  be  in  him  a  fountain  —  nriyri  —  of  water, 
springing  up  into  everlasting  life.'  (John  4  :  14.)  In  another 
place  our  Saviour  utters  these  words  :  '  He  that  heareth  my 
word,  and  believeth  on  him  that  sent  me,  hath  eternal  life^  and 
shall  not  come  into  condemnation,  hut  has  passed  from  death 
into  life^  (John  5  :  24)  — [lera^sSri'xev  Ix  tov  ^uvdiov  slg  xriv 

*  "  The  State  of  the  Impenitent  Dead.    By  Alvah  Hovey,  D.  D."    Boston, 
1859. 


IMMORTALITY    AND    THE   RESURRECTION.  ^b9 

^u)i\f.  Here,  again,  the  believer  is  said  to  have  eternal  life, 
even  now ;  for  he  has  passed  from  death  into  life.  Ingens 
sallus,  renuirks  Beugcl,  with  his  customary  brevity  and 
graphic  power.  "We  translate  a  part  of  Liicke's  ample  and 
instructive  note  on  this  important  verse. 

"  '  The  words,  "  Has  passed  from  death  into  life  "  determine 
that  'exi"'  {hath)  must  be  taken  as  a  strict  present.  For  the 
verb  /itr/iuiie^r/xei'  {has  passed)  affirms  that  the  transition 
from  death  into  life  took  place  with  the  hearing  and  believ- 
ing. Only  if  an  impossible  thought  were  thus  expressed, 
could  we  consent,  as  in  a  case  of  extreme  necessity,  to  under- 
stand the  present  t/fi  and  the  present  perfect  fteTu^iSTjxef  as 
futures.  And  then  we  should  be  compelled  to  say  that  John 
had  expressed  himself  very  strangely.  But  if  a  higher  kind 
of  life,  a  resurrection  process  prior  to  bodily  death,  is  repre- 
sented by  "  hath,"  and  "  hath  passed,"  then  'Qwii  and  ^wi)  uldviog 
are  not  to  be  understood  of  a  life  commencing  after  bodily 
death,  but  of  the  true  and  eternal  Messianic  life  or  salvation, 
beginning  even  here.  This  life  does  not,  to  be  sure,  exclude 
natural  death,  but  neither  does  it  first  begin  after  this  death. 
(Cf.  5  :  40.)  Even  so  xf^uvarog  cannot  be  understood  of  bodily, 
but  only  of  spiritual  death,  of  lying  in  the  dai*kness  of  the 
world.  This  interpretation  would  be  justified  here,  even  if 
■&uPuiog  elsewhere  in  the  New  Testament  denoted  uniformly 
nothing  but  bodily  death.  But  the  metaphorical  idea  of 
death  stands  out  clearly  in  1  John  3  :  14  ;  5  :  16,  17  ;  John 
8  :  51,  52  ;  2  Cor.  2:16;  7  :  10.  Similar,  also,  is  the  use 
of  the  words  ^uvuxovv  (Rom.  7:4;  8:13),  and  vexqdg^ 
vtxqovv^  iinoxi^i'i^^axaiv  (Matt.  8  :  22  ;  Eph.  5  :  14  ;  Heb.  6:1; 
Col.  3:5;  Gal.  2:19).' 

"  With  the  passage  now  examined  may  be  compared  a  state- 
ment of  the  apostle  John  to  the  same  effect,  namely :  '  We 
know  that  we  have  passed  from  death  into  life,  because  we 
love  the  brethren ;  he  that  loveth  not  abideth  in  death.'  (1 
John  3  :  14.)     This  language,  explained  with  a  due  regard 


300  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

to  the  preceding  context,  speaks,  evidently,  of  spiritual  death 
and  life,  of  a  passing  from  one  moral  condition  into  another 
and  opposite  one.  To  say  that  this  new  moral  condition  and 
blessed  state  is  to  endure  and  improve  forever,  may  doubtless 
be  to  utter  an  important  truth,  but  one  which  does  not  con- 
flict in  the  slightest  degree  with  its  present  existence.  It 
begins  in  this  life  ;  it  continues  forever  and  ever. 

"  Again  :  we  find  our  Saviour  saying,  '  He  that  believeth 
on  me  hath  everlasting  life  ; '  '  Except  ye  eat  the  flesh  of 
the  Son  of  man,  and  drink  his  blood,  ye  have  no  life  in  you  ; ' 
and,  '  The  words  that  I  speak  unto  you  are  spirit,  and  are 
life.'  (John  6  :  47,  53,  63.)  By  these  verses  we  are  taught 
once  more,  that  the  Greek  terms  which  denote  life  and  death, 
living  and  dying,  were  applied  by  Christ  to  opposite  moral 
states  of  the  soul.  For,  observe,  (1.)  he  more  than  intimates 
that  his  words,  his  doctrines,  are  the  source  of  present  life  to 
those  who  receive  them,  and  that,  by  eating  his  flesh  and 
drinking  his  blood,  he  signifies  a  reception  of  his  words,  and 
so  of  himself  as  the  Lamb  of  God.  And,  (2.)  he  declares 
that  one  who  believes  has  eternal  life  ;  that  one  who  eats  of 
the  true  bread  shall  not  die,  but  shall  live  forever  ;  and  that 
one  who  does  not  eat  the  flesh  and  drink  the  blood  of  the 
Son  of  man  hath  not  life  in  himself. 

"  Is  it  not  plain  that  the  words  life  and  death,  as  well  as  the 
words  bread,)  flesh,  and  blood,  eating  and  drinking,  are  here 
used  in  a  spiritual  sense  ?  Is  it  not  plain  that  Jesus  here 
speaks  of  something  in  the  believer's  soul  which  is  nourished 
by  Christian  truth,  and  which  is  at  the  same  time  called  life  ? 
But  it  is  the  function  of  truth  to  quicken  thought  and  feeling, 
to  determine  the  modes  of  conscious  life,  the  character  or 
moral  condition  of  the  human  soul ;  and  hence  the  rejection 
of  it  may  involve  the  utter  want  of  certain  spiritual  qualities 
and  blessed  emotions,  but  not  the  want  of  personal  existence. 
In  still  another  place  we  read,  '  Jesus  said  unto  her,  I  am 
the  resurrection  and  the  life  :  he  that  believeth  in  me,  though 


IMMORTALITY   AND   THE    RESURRECTION.  301 

he  were  dead,  yet  shall  he  live  ;  and  whosoever  livetli  and 
believeth  in  me  shall  never  die.'  (John  11  :  25,  26.)  Christ 
here  affirms  that  every  believer  is  exempted  from  death. 
And  it  matters  not  for  our  present  purpose  whether  the  word 
t^''jp,  translated  in  our  version  '  livcth,'  refers  in  this  passage 
to  physical  or  to  moral  life.  If  it  refers  to  physical  life,  then 
our  Saviour  pronounces  the  Christian  to  be  already,  in  time, 
delivered  from  the  power  of  death,  and  in  possession  of  a  true 
and  immortal  life.  But  if  it  refers  to  moral  life,  Christ  de- 
clares that  whoever  possesses  this  life,  whether  in  the  body 
or  out  of  the  body,  is  delivered  from  the  power  of  death ; 
that  is,  his  union  with  God  and  delight  in  him,  which  alone 
constitute  the  normal  living  of  the  soul,  shall  never  be  inter- 
rupted :  ov  ftfi  dno&ui'T]  elg  rbv  alfava  —  he  shall  never  die.  .  .  . 
"  '  And  this  is  life  eternal,'  says  the  Great  Teacher,  '  that 
they  should  know  thee,  the  only  true  God,  and  Jesus  Christ, 
whom  thou  hast  sent.'  (John  17:3.)  The  best  ancient  and 
modern  interpreters  hold  this  verse  to  be  a  definition  by 
Christ  himself  of  the  expression  '  life  eternal,'  so  often  used 
by  him,  according  to  the  record  of  John.  De  "Wette  says, 
'  And  this  is  (therein  consists)  the  life  eternal ;  not,  this  is 
the  means  of  the  eternal  life  ;  for  the  vital  knowledge  of  God 
and  Christ  is  itself  the  eternal  life,  which  begins  even  here, 
and  penetrates  the  whole  life  of  the  human  spirit.-'  Meyer 
translates  thus :  '  Therein  consists  the  eternal  life,'  and  says, 
'  This  knowledge,  willed  of  God,  is  the  "  eternal  life,"  inas- 
much as  it  is  the  essential  subjective  principle  of  the  latter, 
its  enduring,  eternally  unfolding  germ  and  fountain,  both 
now,  in  the  temporal  development  of  the  eternal  life,  and 
hereafter,  when  the  kingdom  is  set  up,  in  which  faith,  hope, 
and  charity  abide,  whose  essence  is  that  knowledge.'  *  The 
same  view,  substantially,  is  pi*eseuted  by  Olshausen,  Liicke, 
Bengel,  Alford,  and  many  others." 

♦  For  "tva  before  a  defining  clause,  see  John  6 :  29 ;  4 :  34 ;  1  John  3 :  11,  23 ;  4 : 
21;  2  John  6. 

26 


302    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

Eternal  life  is  the  gift  of  God  to  the  soul  through  Jesus 
Christ.  It  is  God's  life  communicated  to  man  —  the  life  of 
God  in  the  soul  of  man.  This  is  distinctly  stated  in  the  First 
Epistle  of  John  (chap.  1:1),  as  the  life  which  was  from  the 
beginning,  the  eternal  life  which  Avas  with  the  Father,  but  is 
manifested  to  us,  giving  us  fellowship  with  the  Father  and 
with  his  Son. 

The  root  of  this  eternal  life  is  in  every  human  being.  It 
is  what  we  call  "the  spirit"  in  man,  as  distinguished  from 
the  soul  and  body.  It  is  the  side  of  each  person  which 
touches  the  infinite  and  eternal. 

Fichte,  the  most  spiritual  of  German  philosophers,  says, 
"  Love  is  life.  "Where  I  love,  I  live.  What  I  love,  I  live 
from  that."  *  When  we  love  earthly  things,  our  life  is 
earthly,  that  is,  temporal ;  when  we  love  the  true,  the  right, 
the  good,  our  life  is  spiritual  and  eternal.  Then  we  have 
eternal  life  abiding  in  us.  Then  all  fear  of  death  departs. 
The  great  gift  of  God  through  Christ  was  to  make  the  right 
and  true  also  lovely,  so  that  loving  them,  we  could  draw  our 
life  from  them.  When  God  becomes  lovely  to  us,  by  being 
shown  to  us  as  Jesus  shows  him,  then  by  loving  God  we  live 
from  God,  and  so  have  eternal  life  abiding  in  us. 

The  natural  instinct  of  immortality  is  the  spirit,  or  sense 
of  the  infinite  and  eternal.  But  it  needs  to  be  reenforced  by 
the  influence  of  Christian  conviction,  hope,  and  experience,  in 
order  completely  to  conquer  the  sense  of  death.  It  is  not  by 
logical  arguments  in  proof  of  a  future  existence  that  immor- 
tality becomes  clear  to  us,  but  by  living  an  immortal  life. 
Dr.  Chanuing  says  truly,  "  Immortality  must  begin  here." 
And  so  Hase  (Dogmatic,  §  92)  says,  "Any  proof  which 
should  demonstrate,  with  mathematical  certainty,  to  the  under- 
standing, or  to  the  senses,  the  blessings  or  terrors  of  our 
future  immortality,  would  destroy  morality  in  its  very  roots. 
The  belief  in  immortality  is  therefore  at  first  only  a  wish, 

*  Die  Bestimmung  des  Menschen.    Berlin,  1800. 


IMMORTALITY    AND   THE   RESURRECTION.  803 

and  a  belief  on  the  authority  of  others ;  but  the  more  tliat 
any  one  assures  to  himself  his  spiritual  life  by  his  own  free 
efforts  and  a  pure  love  for  goodness,  the  more  certain  also 
does  eternity  become,  not  merely  as  something  future,  but  as 
something  already  begun."  * 

Whenever  Jesus  is  said  to  give  eternal  life,  or  to  he  the 
life  of  the  world  ;  whenever  the  apostles  declare  Christ  to  be 
their  life,  or  say  that  as  in  Adam  all  die,  so  in  Christ  shall 
all  be  made  alive ;  when  Paul  says,  "  The  law  of  the  Spirit 
of  life  in  Christ  Jesus  has  made  me  free  from  the  law  of  sin 


*  In  addition  to  the  extracts  from  Professor  Hovey,  Meyer,  Liicke,  and  De 
TTette,  the  following^ passages  from  F.  D.  Maurice  ("Theological  Essays") 
are  interesting,  as  showing  a  concurrence  of  testimony  from  yet  another  quar- 
ter to  the  thesis  of  this  section :  — 

"  When  any  one  ventures  to  say  to  an  English  audience,  that  eternity  is  not 
a  mere  negation  of  time,  that  it  denotes  something  real,  substantial,  before  all 
time,  he  is  told  at  once  that  he  is  departing  from  the  simple,  intelligible  meaning 
of  words;  that  he  is  introducing  novelties;  that  he  is  talking  abstractions. 
This  language  is  perfectly  honest  in  the  mouths  of  those  who  use  it.  But  they 
do  not  know  where  they  learned  it.  Tliey  did  not  get  it  from  peasants,  or 
women,  or  children.  They  did  not  get  it  from  the  Bible.  They  got  it  from 
Locke.  And  if  I  find  that  I  cannot  interpret  the  language  and  thoughts  of 
peasants,  and  women,  and  children,  and  that  I  cannot  interpret  the  plainest 
passages  of  the  Bible,  or  tlie  whole  context  of  it,  while  I  look  through  the 
Locke  spectacles,  I  must  cast  them  aside.  .  .  . 

"  Suppose,  instead  of  taking  this  ntethod  of  asserting  the  truth  of  all  God's 
words,  the  most  blessed  and  the  most  tremendous,  we  reject  the  wisdom  of 
our  forefathers,  and  enact  an  article  declaring  that  all  are  heretics,  and  deniers 
of  the  truth,  who  do  not  hold  that  eternal  means  endless,  and  that  there  can- 
not be  a  deliverance  from  eternal  punishment.  What  is  the  consequence  i 
Simply  this,  I  believe :  the  whole  gospel  of  God  is  set  aside.  The  state  of 
eternal  life  and  eternal  death  is  not  one  we  can  refer  only  to  the  future,  or  that 
we  can  in  any  wise  identify  with  the  future.  Every  man  who  knows  what  it  is 
to  have  been  in  a  state  of  sin,  knows  what  it  is  to  have  been  in  a  state  of  death. 
He  cannot  connect  that  death  with  time ;  he  must  say  that  Christ  has  brought 
him  out  of  the  bonds  of  eternal  death.  Throw  that  idea  into  the  future,  and 
you  deprive  it  of  all  its  reality,  of  all  its  power.  I  know  what  it  means  all  too 
well  while  you  let  me  connect  it  with  my  present  and  personal  being,  with  the 
pangs  of  conscience  which  I  suffer  now.  It  becomes  a  mere  vague  dream  and 
shadow  to  me  when  you  project  it  into  a  distant  world.  And  if  you  take  from 
me  the  belief  that  God  is  always  righteous,  always  maintaining  a  light  with 
evil,  always  seeking  to  bring  his  creatures  out  of  it,  you  take  everything  from 
me  —  all  hope  now,  all  hope  in  the  world  to  come.  Atonement,  redemption, 
satisfaction,  regeneration,  become  mere  words,  to  which  there  is  no  counter- 
part in  reality." 


804    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

and  death  ;  "  "  to  be  spiritually  miaded  is  life  and  peace  ;  " 
"  the  life  of  Jesus  is  manifested  in  our  dying  (mortal)  flesh  ;  " 
when  John  says,  "  He  that  hath  the  Son  hath  life ; "  when 
in  Revelation  we  "read  of  the  book  of  life,  and  water  of  life, 
and  tree  of  life,  —  the  meaning  is  always  the  same.  It  refers 
to  the  spiritual  vitality  added  to  the  soul  by  the  influence  of 
Jesus,  who  communicates  God's  love,  and  so  enables  us  to 
LOVE  God,  instead  of  merely  fearing  him  or  obeying  him. 
Love  easts  out  all  fear,  the  fear  of  death  included.  He  who 
looks  at  the  things  unseen  and  eternal,  partakes  of  their 
eternal  nature,  and  though  his  outward  human  nature  per- 
ishes, his  inward  spiritual  nature  is  renewed  day  by  day. 

§  5.  Resurrection,  and  its  real  Meaning,  as  a  Rising  up,  and 
not  a  Rising  again.  —  One  part  of  the  Christian  doctrine  of 
immortality  is  conveyed  in  the  term  "  eternal  life  ; "  the  other 
part  in  the  other  term,  usually  associated  with  it  —  "  the  resur- 
rection." The  common  Orthodox  doctrine  of  the  resurrec- 
tion, is  that  the  dead  shall  rise  with  the  same  bodies  as  those 
laid  in  earth  ;  and  this  identity  is  usually  made  to  consist  in 
identity  of  matter,  though  Paul  expressly  says,  "  Thou  sowest 
not  that  body  that  shall  be."  On  the  other  hand,  many  lib- 
eral thinkers  of  the  Spiritual  School  deny  any  resurrection, 
and  think  the  whole  doctrine  of  the  resurrection  a  Jewish 
error,  believing  in  a  purely  spiritual  existence  hereafter. 
Others,  like  Swedenborg,  teach  that  the  soul  hereafter  dwells 
in  a  body,  though  of  a  more  refined  and  sublimated  charac- 
ter ;  and  in  this  we  think  they  approach  more  nearly  the 
teaching  of  the  New  Testament. 

It  is  a  remarkable  fact  that  the  Greek  words  indicating 
the  rising  of  men  should  have  been  translated,  in  our  English 
Bible,  by  terms  signifying  something  wholly  different,  and 
conveying  another  sense  than  that  in  the  original.  It  is 
equally  extraordinary  that  this  change  of  meaning  should 
seldom  or  never  be  alluded  to  by  theological  writers. 

These   words,   translated    "  resurrection,"    "  rise   again," 


IMMORTALITY    AND   THE   RESURRECTION.  805 

and  the  like,  all  have,  in  the  Greek,  the  sense  of  risuig  up, 
not  of  rising  again.  They  signify  not  return,  but  ascent ; 
not  coming  back  to  this  life,  but  going  forward  to  a  higher. 
The  difference  in  meaning  is  apparent  and  very  important. 
It  is  one  thing  to  say,  that  at  death  we  go  down  into  Hades, 
or  into  dissolution,  and  at  the  resurrection  we  come  back 
to  conscious  existence,  or  to  the  same  life  we  had  before, 
and  quite  a  different  thing  to  say  that  what  we  call  death  is 
nothing  ;  but  that  we  rise  ^lp,  and  go  forward  when  we  seem 
to  die.  This  last  is  the  doctrine  of  the  New  Testament, 
though  the  former  is  the  one  usually  believed  to  be  taught 
in  it. 

The  immense  stress  laid,  in  the  New  Testament,  on  the 
resurrection  of  Jesus  is  by  no  means  explained  by  supposing 
that  after  his  death  he  came  to  life  again,  and  so  proved  that 
there  is  a  life  after  death.  What  he  showed  his  disciples 
was,  that  death  was  not  going  down,  but  going  up  ;  not  de- 
scent into  the  grave,  or  Hades,  but  ascent  to  a  higher  world. 
This  is  the  evident  sense  of  such  passages  as  these.  We 
have  not  room  to  go  over  all  the  passages  which  should  be 
noticed  in  a  critical  examination,  but  select  a  few  of  the  most 
prominent. 

1.  '.IvudTuaig,  commonly  translated  "resurrection,"  or 
"  rising  again,"  but  which  literally  means  "  rising  up."  (So 
Bretschneider,  "  Lexicon  Man.  in  lib.  Nov.  Test."  defines  it 
as  "  resurrectio,  rectius  surrectio.")  * 

This  word  occurs  forty-two  times  in  the  New  Testament. 
In  none  of  them  (unless  there  be  a  single  exception,  which 
we  shall  presently  consider)  does  it  necessarily  mean  a  rising 
again,  or  coming  back  to  the  same  level  of  life  as  before. 
In  a  large  number  of  instances  the  word  can  only  mean  a 
rising  up,  or  ascent  to  a  higher  state.  Of  these  cases  we  will 
cite  a  few  examples. 

•  In  the  German  Bible  we  have  the  true  word  —  "  Auferstehung." 

26* 


306     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

Ten  of  the  passages  in  which  the  word  'av&aracng  occurs, 
ax'e  in  the  account  by  the  Synoptics  of  the  discussion  between 
Jesus  and  the  Sadducees  concerning  the  case  of  the  woman 
married  to  seven  brothers.  After  stating  the  case,  they  say, 
"Therefore,  m  the  resurrection,  Avhose  wife  of  them  is  she?" 
It  is  plain  that  the  word  "  resurrection  "  here  is  equivalent 
to  "the  future  state,"  and  cannot  be  limited  to  a  return  to 
life.  This  becomes  more  apparent  in  the  answer  of  Jesus,  as 
given,  somewhat  varied,  by  the  three  Synoptics  :  "  In  the 
resurrection  they  neither  marry  nor  are  given  in  marriage, 
but  are  as  the  angels  of  God  in  heaven."  (Matt.  22  :  30.) 
Mark,  instead  of  "  the  resurrection,"  has  the  corresponding 
verb,  "  when  they  shall  rise  from  the  dead."  This  certainly 
means,  not  rising  again,  but  rising  up,  ascending  to  a  higher 
state.  And  Luke  adds  another  element,  showing  that  the 
"  resurrection  "  is  a  state  to  which  all  may  not  attain,  but 
which  is  dependent  on  character  ;  evidently  therefore  a  higher 
state.  "  They  which  shall  be  accounted  worthy  to  obtain 
that  world  (roO  alibvos  i/Fivov),  and  the  resurrection  from 
the  dead,  neither  marry  nor  are  given  in  marriage  ;  neither 
can  they  die  any  more,  for  they  arc  equal  unto  the  angels  "  (or 
rather  "  are  like  the  angels  ")  "  and  are  children  of  God,  being 
children  of  the  resurrection."  (Luke  20  :  35,  36.)  This  last 
phrase,  "  children  of  the  resurrection,"  is  very  significant, 
and  intends  a  character  corresponding  to  this  higher  state. 
There  seems,  indeed,  to  be  a  contradiction  between  this  pas- 
sage, which  makes  the  resurrection  conditional,  and  those 
which  declare  it  universal.  (See  John  5  :  29,  and  1  Cor.  oh. 
15.)  But  perhaps  the  reconciliation  can  be  found  in  the 
apostolic  statement  (1  Cor.  15  :  23)  "  every  one  in  his  order." 
All  shall  ascend  into  the  higher  state,  called  "  the  resurrec- 
tion," but  only  as  they  become  prepared  for  it.  All  are  not 
now  prepared  to  hear  the  voice  of  the  Son  of  man  (or  of 
divine  truth),  which  shall  cause  them  to  rise  to  the  resurrec- 


IMMORTALITY    AND   THE   RESURRECTION.  307 

tioD  of  life  and  of  jiulgmeut ;  but,  in  due  season,  all  shall 
come  forth  from  their  graves,  and  hear  it. 

Another  passage  in  which  this  word  occurs  is  in  Luke  2  : 
3-i,  Avhere  Simon  says,  "  This  child  is  set  for  the  fall  and 
rising  again  (i»'(iCTT«CTfj')  of  many  in  Israel."  A  moral  fall 
and  rising  are  here  evident ;  and  only  if  the  reduplication  be 
dropped,  and  we  read  "  for  the  fall  and  the  rising  up,"  do  we 
get  the  true  idea.  It  is  not  meant  that  Jesus  comes  to  de- 
grade us  morally,  and  then  lift  us  up  again  morally.  Rather 
it  means  that  he  comes  to  test  the  state  of  the  hearts  of  men  : 
some  cannot  bear  the  test,  and  fall  before  it ;  others,  better 
pi'epared,  rise  higher.  Here,  also,  ^vuajuaig  means  rising 
up,  and  not  rising  again. 

The  most  remarkable  use  of  this  word,  however,  is  in  that 
famous  passage  where  the  common  meaning  is  wholly  unin- 
telligible, in  the  story  of  Lazarus.  (John  11  :  24,  25.)  Jesus 
says,  "  I  am  the  resurrection  and  the  life."  If  resurrection 
means  coming  back  to  life  after  death,  in  what  sense  can 
Jesus  be  "  the  resurrection  and  the  life"?  Then  Jesus  said 
that  he  was  "  the  coming  back  to  life,"  which  is  unintelligi- 
ble. But  if  the  resurrection  means  the  ascent  to  a  higher 
state,  then  Jesus  declares  that  he  is  the  way  of  ascent  to  a 
higher  state,  jnst  as  he  says  elsewhere,  "  I  am  the  way  ;"  "I 
am  the  door."  It  is  the  power  of  Christ  within  the  soul,  the 
power  of  his  spirit  of  faith,  hope,  and  love,  which  enables  us 
to  go  forward  and  upward.  Christ  is  not  the  principle  of 
resuscitation  to  an  earthly  existence,  or  a  merely  human  im- 
mortality. He  does  not  bring  us  to  life  again,  but  he  lifts 
us  up.  So  he  adds,  "  He  who  believeth  in  me,  though  he 
were  dead,  yet  shall  he  live."  Not,  shall  come  to  life  again  ; 
no.  but,  shall  rise  out  of  death  into  life,  ascend  into  a  higher 
condition  of  being.  Then  he  adds  that  to  one  who  has  faith 
in  him,  who  has  adopted  his  ideas,  there  is  no  longer  any  such 
thing  as  death.  Death  has  disappeared  —  is  abolished.  "  He 
who  liveth  and  believeth  in  me  shall  never  die." 


308    orthodoxy:  its  teuths  and  erroes. 

But,  it  may  be  objected,  if  spiritual  death  and  life  are  here 
spoken  of,  —  if  the  passage  means  that  he  who  believeth  in 
Christ  shall  have  inward  religious  spiritual  life,  a  heavenly 
and  celestial  life,  —  then  how  could  that  comfort  Martha,  or 
apply  to  her  case,  who  was  mourning,  not  the  spiritual,  but 
the  natural,  death  of  her  brother  ? 

Christ  is  essentially  a  manifestation  of  the  truth  and  love 
of  God.  To  believe  in  him  is  therefore  to  believe  in  God's 
truth  and  love.  But  belief  in  this  fills  the  soul  with  life. 
And  the  soul  full  of  life  cannot  die.  What  seems  death  is 
only  change,  and  a  change  from  a  lower  to  a  higher  state, 
therefore  rising  up,  or  resurrection.  Christ,  then,  the  love 
and  truth  of  God  in  the  soul,  is  the  life  and  the  resurrection. 
He  fills  the  soul  with  that  life  which  causes  it  to  rise  with 
every  change,  to  go  up  and  on  evermore  to  a  higher  state. 
That  which  seems  death  is  nothing ;  the  only  real  death  is 
the  immersion  of  the  soul  in  sense  and  evil,  the  turning 
away  from  truth  and  God. 

Now,  Martha  believed,  as  most  of  us  believe,  in  a  future 
resurrection.  She  believed  that,  after  lying  a  long  time  in 
the  grave,  one  would  come  out  of  it  at  last,  on  a  great  day 
of  judgment,  and  somehow  the  soul  and  body  be  reunited. 
She  believed  this,  for  it  was  the  general  belief  of  the  Jews 
in  her  day.  It  is  the  general  belief  of  Christians  now.  The 
majority  of  Christians  have  not  got  very  far  beyond  that. 
They  talk  of  the  resurrection,  as  though  it  were  merely  the 
return  of  the  soul  into  the  old  body  ;  and  when  you  comfort 
them  over  their  dead  by  saying,  "  Your  dead  will  rise,"  re- 
ply, "  I  know  it  —  at  the  resun-ection,  at  the  last  day."  But 
Jesus  tells  Martha,  and  all  the  Martha  Christians  of  the 
present  time,  that  he  is  the  resurrection  and  the  life.  Your 
brother  is  not  to  sleep  in  the  dust  till  the  last  day,  and  then 
rise.  He  does  not  die  at  all.  He  rises  with  Christ  here, 
and  in  whatever  other  world.  His  nature  is  to  go  wp,  not 
down,  when  he  is  Christianized.     Now  or  then,  to-day  or  at 


IMMORTALITY    AND   THE   RESURRECTION.  309 

the  last  day,  if  he  has  the  living  faith  of  a  son  of  God,  he 
•will  be  raised  by  that  Christ  within  him,  who  is  his  life. 

This,  it  seems  to  us,  is  the  only  adequate  explanation  of 
this  passage,  and  shows  conclusively  that  resurrection  must 
mean,  in  this  place,  a  rising  up  to  a  higher  existence,  and  not 
a  mere  return  to  this  life. 

It  appears,  from  1  Cor.  ch.  15,  that  there  were  some  in  the 
Christian  church  who  said  there  was  no  resurrection  of  the 
dead  (JtviLGtaaig  vex^uj',)  or  that  it  was  past  already.  (2 
Tim.  2  :  18.)  These  Christians  did  not  deny  the  doctrine  of 
immortality,  or  a  future  life.  It  is  difficult  to  imagine  the 
motive  which  could  induce  any  one,  in  those  days,  to  join  the 
Christian  church,  if  he  denied  a  future  life.  Probably,  there- 
fore, they  assumed  that  the  only  real  resurrection  takes  place 
in  the  soul  when  we  rise  with  Christ.  They  said,  "  If  we  are 
to  rise  into  a  higher  life  after  this,  hoxv  shall  we  rise,  and  with 
what  bodies?"  (1  Cor.  15:35.)  They  professed  to  believe 
in  a  simple  immortality  of  the  soul,  but  not  an  ascent  of  the 
personal  being,  soul  and  body  together,  to  the  presence  of 
God.  •  They  did  not  question  a  future  life,  but  a  higher  life  to 
which  soul  and  body  should  go  up  together. 

To  these  doubting  Christians,  who  could  not  gather  strength 
to  believe  in  such  a  great  progress  as  this,  Paul  says  that  if 
man  does  not  rise,  if  it  is  contrary  to  his  nature  to  rise,  then 
Jesus,  being  a  man,  has  not  risen,  but  gone  down  to  Hades  with 
other  souls.  Then  he  is  not  above  us,  with  God,  sending  down 
strength  and  inspiration  from  our  work.  This  faith  of  ours, 
which  has  been  our  great  support,  is  an  illusion.  We  have 
all  been  deceived  —  deceived  in  preaching  forgiveness  of  sins 
through  Christ  from  God  ;  deceived  in  preaching  a  higher 
life  above  us,  into  which  Christ  has  gone,  and  where  he  is 
waiting  to  receive  us.  But  we  have  not  been  deceived  — 
Christ  has  risen,  and  risen  as  the  first  fruits  of  humanity. 
He  leads  the  way  up,  and  in  proportion  as  we  share  his  life, 
we  also  have  in  ourselves  the  principle  of  ascent,  and  shall 


310  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS    AND    ERRORS. 

go  up  too.  He  goes  first ;  then  all  who  are  like  him  follow  ; 
and  finally,  in  due  order,  all  mankind.  Death  and  Hades 
have  been  conquered  by  this  new  influx  of  life  in  Christ. 
Instead  of  remaining  pale  ghosts,  naked  souls,  we  shall  rise 
into  a  fuller,  richer,  larger  life,  of  soul  and  body. 

There  is  one  passage,  however,  where  there  seems  a  diffi- 
culty in  considering  avdataaig,  or  resurrection,  as  implying 
an  ascent  of  condition.  It  is  in  John  5  :  28,  29.  Our  com- 
mon translation  reads  thus  :  "  The  hour  is  coming  in  which 
all  that  are  in  the  graves  shall  hear  his  voice  (that  is,  the 
voice  of  the  Son  of  man),  and  shall  come  forth,  they  that 
have  done  good  unto  the  resurrection  of  life,  and  they  that 
have  done  evil  unto  the  resurrection  of  damnation."  At  first 
sight  it  certainly  seems  that  the  "  resurrection  of  damna- 
tion" (jivduTuaiv  xQlaso);)  could  hai'dly  be  considered  a 
higher  state.  All  depends,  however,  on  the  meaning  of  the 
word,  here  translated  "  damnation."  The  word,  in  the 
Greek,  is  the  genitive  of  xglaig.  Now,  by  turning  to  the 
Concordance,  we  find  that  this  word  xQlaig  occurs  some  forty- 
eight  times  in  the  New  Testament.  In  these  places,  — 
It  is  translated  3  times  by  "  damnation." 
"  "  2         "        "condemnation." 

"  "  2         "        "accusation." 

"  "        41  "        "judgment." 

It  is  evident,  therefore,  that  our  translators  considered  judg- 
ment to  be  the  primary  and  usual  meaning  of  the  word.  Why, 
then,  did  they  not  translate  it  here,  "  rising  to  judgment,"  or 
"resurrection  of  judgment"?  It  must  have  been  because 
they  believed  either  that  (1.)  "judgment"  would  make  no 
sense  here  ;  (2.)  that  "  damnation  "  would  make  better  sense  ; 
or,  (3.)  that  "damnation"  was  more  in  accordance  with 
the  analogy  of  faith.  But  we  can  decide  these  points  for 
ourselves.  "Judgment"  is  the  better  word  here,  for  it 
accords  with  the  doctrine  of  the  New  Testament,  that  in 
proportion  as  man  goes  wrong,  he  dulls  his  moral  sense,  and 


IMMORTALITY   AND   THE   RESURRECTION.  311 

needs  a  revelation  of  truth  to  show  him  what  he  is.  A  true 
man,  who  has  lived  accoi'diog  to  the  truth  here,  has  judged 
himself,  and  will  not  need  to  be  judged  hereafter.  (1  Cor. 
11  :  31.)  He  rises  into  the  resurrection  of  life.  But  those 
who  follow  falsehood  here,  need  to  see  the  truth;  and  they 
rise  into  tlie  resurrection  of  judgment.  The  truth  judges 
and  condemns  them.  But  this  is  really  an  ascent  to  them 
also.  It  is  going  up  higher,  to  see  the  truth,  even  when  it 
condemns  them.  This  passage,  then,  is  no  exception  to  the 
principle  that  wherever  "resurrection"  (6«'(ioT«CT/j)  occurs 
in  the  New  Testament,  it  implies  going  up  into  a  higher 
state. 

All  the  other  places  where  the  word  occurs  either  evident- 
ly have  this  meaning,  or  can  bear  it  as  easily  as  the  other. 
Thus  (Luke  14:14),  "Thou  shalt  be  recompensed  in  the 
higher  state  of  the  just."  (20  :  27),  the  Sadducees  "  deny  a 
higher  state."  (Acts  1 :  21),  "  he  is  to  be  a  witness  with  us 
of  the  ascended  state  of  Jesus."  (Acts  4:2),  "preached, 
through  Jesus,  the  higher  state  of  the  dead."  (17:18), 
"  preached  to  them  Jesus  and  the  higher  state."  (26:23), 
that  Christ  "  should  be  the  first  to  rise  into  the  higher  state." 
(Lazarus  and  others  had  returned  to  life  again  before  Jesus, 
so  that  in  this  sense  he  was  not  the  first  fruits.)  (Rom.  6:5), 
"  planted  in  the  likeness  of  his  resurrection."  This  can  only 
mean  as  Chi*ist  passed  through  the  grave  into  a  higher  state, 
so  we  pass  through  baptism  into  a  higher  state. 

The  only  text  which  presents  any  real  difficulty  is  Heb. 
11:35,  translated,  "women  received  their  dead  raised  to 
life  again,"  literally,  "  women  received  from  the  resurrection 
their  dead"  (^f  dcPaaTiaeoj;),  which  may  refer  to  a  return 
to  this  life,  as  in  the  case  of  the  child  of  the  widow  of  Sa- 
repta  (1  Kings  17:17),  and  of  the  Shunamite  (2  Kings 
4:17).*     But  in  the  same  verse,  the  other  and  "better" 

*  So  De  Wette,  Eurzgefasstes  exegetisches  Handbuch  zam  N.  T.,  ad  locum. 


812  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND    ERRORS. 

resurrection  is  spoken  of,  for  the  sake  of  which  these  martyrs 
refused  to  return  to  this  life.  The  case  referred  to  is  proba- 
bly that  of  the  record  of  the  seven  brothers  put  to  death  by 
Antiochus  (2  Mace.  7:9),  who  refused  life  offered  on  condi- 
tion of  eating  swine's  flesh,  and  said,  when  dying,  "  The  King 
of  the  world  shall  raise  us  up,  who  have  died  for  his  laws,  unto 
everlasting  life"  (it?  dcKoviof  dfadltouiv  Ccoijs  dvixTr^ast  r^juug^^ 
literally,  "  to  an  eternal  renewal  of  our  life."  *  This  verse 
shows,  therefore,  that  though  dcv&araaig  may  mean  a  return 
to  this  life,  yet  that  the  other  sense  of  a  higher  life  is  express- 
ly contrasted  with  it,  even  here. 

Our  conclusion,  therefore,  with  regard  to  this  term 
divdaTaaig^  is,  that  its  meaning,  in  New  Testament  usage,  is 
not  "rising  again,"  but  "rising  up,"  or  "  ascent." 

2.  '-"fflcnrj/iti.  This  word  is  the  root  of  the  former.  It 
is  used  one  hundred  and  twelve  times  in  the  New  Testament. 
It  is  translated  with  again  (as,  "  he  must  rise  again  from  the 
dead")  fifteen  times.  It  is  translated  thirty-six  times  "rise 
up"  or  "  raise  lop"  (as,  "I  will  raise  him  up  at  the  last 
day"),  and  ninety-six  times  without  the  "  again."  It  is  ren- 
dered "  he  arose"  "  shall  Wse,"  "  stood  up,"  "  raise  up," 
"  arise,"  and  in  similar  ways. 

3.  'EyelQw.  This  word  is  also  frequently  used  in  relation 
to  the  resurrection,  and  is  translated  "  to  awaken,"  "  arouse," 
"  animate,"  "  revive."  The  natural  and  usual  meaning  is 
ascent  to  a  higher  state,  and  not  merely  a  "  rising  again." 

From  these  considerations  we  see  that  the  primitive  and 
central  meaning  of  the  terms  used  to  express  the  resurrection 
is  that  of  ASCENT.  It  is  GOING  UP.  This  is  the  essential 
Christian  idea.  But  it  soon  became  implicated  with  the 
Pagan  idea  of  immortality,  or  continued  existence  of  the 
soul,  and  the  Jewish  idea  of  a  bodily  resurrection  at  the  last 

*  So  Schleusner,  Lexicon  in  LXX. 


IMMORTALITY    AND   THE   RESURRECTION.  313 

day.  But  though  there  is  a  truth  in  each  of  these  be- 
liefs, the  Christian  doctrine  is  neither  one  nor  the  other. 
The  gospel  assumes,  but  does  not  teach,  a  continued  existence 
of  the  soul.  Since  the  greater  includes  the  less,  in  teach- 
ing that  the  man  rises  at  death  into  a  higher  life,  it  neces- 
sarily implies  that  he  continues  to  live.  And  in  teaching 
that  he  is  to  exist  as  man,  with  soul  and  body,  in  a  higher 
condition  of  development,  it  teaches  necessarily  the  bodily- 
resurrection  of  the  Jews.  Christ,  who  came  "  not  to  destroy, 
but  to  fulfil,"  FULFILS  both  Pagan  and  Jewish  ideas  of  the 
future  state  in  this  doctrine  of  an  ascension  at  death. 

The  principal  points  of  the  teaching  of  Jesus  concerning 
the  life  which  follows  the  dissolution  of  the  body  are  these  : 
First.  As  against  the  Sadducees,  he  argues  that  the  dead  are 
living  (Matt.  22:31,  and  the  parallel  passages),  from  the 
simple  fact  that  God  calls  them  his.  If  God  thinks  of  them 
as  his,  that  is  enough.  His  thinking  of  them  makes  them 
alive.  No  one  can  perish  while  God  is  thinking  of  him  with 
love.  Such  an  argument,  carrying  no  weight  to  the  mere 
understanding,  is  convincing  in  proportion  as  one  is  filled 
with  a  spiritual  conception  of  God.  Secondly.  Jesus 
abolishes  death  by  teaching  that  there  is  no  such  thing  to 
the  soul  which  shares  his  ideas  concerning  God  and  the 
universe.  This  is  implied  in  the  phrases,  "  He  that  liveth 
and  believeth  in  me  shall  never  die."  (John  11  :  26.)  "  He 
that  believeth  on  me  hath  everlasting  life."  (John  6  :  47.) 
"  I  am  the  living  bread,  whereof  if  a  man  eat,  he  shall  live 
forever."  (John  6  :  51.)  "  Whoso  eateth  my  flesh,  and 
drinketh  my  blood,  hath  eternal  life."  (John  6  :  54.)  "  If 
a  man  keep  my  saying,  he  shall  never  see  death."  Here, 
"  eating  Christ's  flesh,  and  drinking  his  blood,"  is  plainly 
equivalent  to  "keeping  his  saying,  "  and  "  believing  on  him." 
As  food  ■which  we  eat  and  drink  changes  itself  so  as  to  be- 
come a  part  of  our  own  body  by  assimilation,  so  Christ 
intends  that  his  truth  shall  not  be  merely  taken  into  the 
27 


314  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

memory,  and  reproduced  in  words,  but  shall  be  taken  into  the 
life,  and  reproduced  in  character.  Thirdly.  He  teaches 
that  as  feeding  on  his  truth  changes  our  natural  life  into 
spiritual  life,  and  lifts  temporal  existence  into  eternal  being, 
so  it  will  also  place  us  outwardly  in  a  higher  state  and 
higher  relations,  to  which  state  he  applies  the  familiar  term 
the  "  resurrection  "  or  "  ascent,"  the  "going  up."  "  I  will 
raise  him  up  at  the  last  day."  The  "  last  day,"  in  Jewish 
and  New  Testament  usage,  means  the  Messianic  times,  as 
appears  from  such  passages  as  Acts  2:17,  where  the  term  is 
used  of  the  day  of  Pentecost ;  Heb.  1:2,  *■'  hath  in  these 
last  days  spoken  unto  us  by  his  Son ; "  1  John  2  :  18, 
"  Little  children,  it  is  the  last  time."  Jesus  tells  his  dis- 
ciples that  he  is  going  to  the  Father  (John  14 :  15),  in  whose 
house  are  many  mansions,  where  he  is  to  prepare  a  place  for 
his  disciples.      (John  14  :  2.) 

That  "  resurrection "  was  understood  to  mean  a  present 
higher  state,  and  not  a  future  return  to  life,  appears  also 
from  its  use  by  the  apostles.  Chi'istians  are  spoken  of  as 
having  already  "risen  with  Christ"  (Col.  3:1);  "risen 
with  him  in  baptism"  (Col.  3  :  1)  ;  walking  "in  the  like- 
ness of  his  resurrection"  (Rom.  6:5).  And,  no  doubt,  it 
was  by  making  this  idea  of  a  present  resurrection  too  exclu- 
sive, that  some  Christians  maintained  that  it  was  wholly  a 
present  resurrection,  and  not  at  all  future  —  that  "it  was 
past  already." 

This  Christian  faith  in  "  resurrection "  as  ascent  to  a 
higher  condition  of  being  at  death  is  practically  borne  wit- 
ness to  by  such  common  expressions  concerning  departed 
fricE,ds  as  these  :  "  He  has  gone  to  a  better  world  ;  "  "  He 
is  in  a  higher  world  than  this  ; "  "  We  ought  not  to  grieve 
for  him  —  he  is  better  off  than  he  was."  The  practical 
sense  of  Christendom  has  taken  this  faith  from  the  Gospels, 
though  the  Creeds  do  not  authorize  it.  The  Creeds  teach  that 
the  souls  of  the  good  either  sleep  till  a  futm'e  resurrection,  or 


IMMORTALITY    AND   THE   RESURRECTION.  315 

are  absorbed  into  God.  until  then,  while  the  souls  of  the 
impenitent  descend  to  a  lower  sphere.  Christ  teaches  that 
at  death  all  rise  to  a  higher  state  —  of  life  and  love  to  the 
loving,  or  judgment  by  the  sight  of  truth  to  the  selfish  ;  but 
higher  to  all.  Paul  declares  that  "  as  in  Adam  all  die,  even 
so  in  Christ  shall  all  be  made  alive,"  making  the  rise  equiv- 
alent in  extent  to  the  fall. 

The  great  change  in  the  faith  of  the  apostles,  in  conse- 
quence of  the  resurrection  or  ascent  of  Christ,  was  this  : 
They  before  believed  that  at  death  all  went  to  Hades,  to  the 
gloomy  underworld  of  shadows,  there  to  remain  till  the  final 
resurrection.  But  the  belief  that  Christ,  instead  of  going 
down,  had  gone  up,  and  had  assured  them  that  all  who  had 
faith  in  him  had  the  principle  of  ascent  in  their  souls,  and 
were  already  spiritually  risen,  —  this  took  the  victory  from 
Hades  and  the  sting  from  death. 

To  Christians,  at  least,  Hades  is  no  more  anything ;  all 
who  have  a  living  faith  rise  with  Christ  ;,and  sooner  or  later, 
each  in  his  order,  all  shall  rise.  This  was  the  "  power  of 
the  resurrection"  of  Jesus  to  destroy  the  fear  of  death,  to 
enable  them  "to  attain"  now  "to  the  resurrection  of  the 
dead"  (Phil.  3:10),  teaching  that  "if  the  Spirit  of  Him 
who  raised  up  Jesus  from  the  dead  dwell  in  you,  he  that 
raised  up  Jesus  from  the  dead  shall  also  quicken  your  mortal 
bodies  by  his  Spirit  that  dwells  in  you."  "  For  it  is  Christ 
that  died,  yea.,  rather,  that  is  risen,  who  is  even  at  the  right 
hand  of  God,  who  also  maketh  intercession  for  us."  It  was, 
therefore,  the  duty  of  aU  Christians,  since  they  were  risen  in 
Christ,  "  to  seek  the  things  which  are  above." 

§  6.  Resurrection  of  the  Body,  as  taught  in  the  New  Testa- 
ment, not  a  Rising  again  of  the  same  Body,  hut  the  Ascent  into 
a  higher  Body.  —  It  is  remarkable  that  those  who  profess 
to  believe  in  the  literal  inspiration  of  the  New  Testament 
should  nevertheless  very  generally  teach  that  the  future  body 
is  materially  the  same  as  this.     We  often  hear  labored  argu- 


316     OETHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

ments  to  show  how  the  identical  chemical  particles  which 
compose  the  body  at  death  may  be  re-collected  from  all  quar- 
ters at  the  resurrection.  Yet  the  only  place  where  any  ac- 
count is  given  of  the  future  body,  declares  explicitly  that  it 
is  different  from  the  present,  just  as  the  stalk  which  comes 
out  of  the  ground  differs  from  the  seed  planted.  "  We  sow 
not  the  body  which  shall  be,  but  bare  grain,  and  God  giveth 
it  a  body  as  pleaseth  him." 

Many  persons,  however,  take  an  opposite  view,  and  have 
no  belief  in  any  future  bodily  existence.  They  speak  much 
more  frequently  of  the  immortality  of  the  soul.  But  the  res- 
urrection of  the  body  is  unquestionably  a  doctrine  of  the 
New  Testament,  while  the  immortality  of  the  soul  is  not. 
The  New  Testament  knows  nothing  of  a  purely  spiritual  ex- 
istence hereafter,  nothing  of  an  abstract  disembodied  immor- 
tality. The  reaction  from  materialism  to  idealism  has  caused 
us  now  to  undervalue  bodily  existence.  So  it  did  among  the 
Corinthians  to  whqm  Paul  wrote,  "^  How  say  some  among 
you  that  there  is  no  resurrection  of  the  dead  ?  "  These  Co- 
rinthians were  not  Sadducees,  nor  Epicureans.  There  is  no 
evidence  that  these  sects  had  any  influence  on  the  Christian 
Church.  They  did  not  deny  a  future  existence,  but  they 
denied  a  rising  up  and  a  future  bodily  existence.  They 
believed,  like  us,  in  an  immortality  of  the  soul,  denying  the 
possibility  (probably  on  philosophical  grounds)  of  the  resur- 
rection of  the  body.  So  Paul  proceeds,  in  the  fifteenth  chap- 
ter of  Corinthians,  first  to  prove  the  fact,  and  then  to  explain 
the  nature  of  a  bodily  resurrection. 

Let  us  consider,  first,  what  is  meant  by  a  resurrection  of 
the  body. 

This  word  resurrection  tends  to  mislead  us  by  suggesting 
ihe  rising  from  the  grave  of  the  material  body  there  depos- 
ited ;  and  accordingly  we  have  the  theory  which  makes 
the  future  body  the  mere  revival  of  the  same  particles  of 
matter  composing  the  present  body.     But  the  Greek  word, 


IMMORTALITY   AND   THE   RESURRECTION.  317 

as  we  have  fully  shown,  means  not  merely  rising  out  of  tlie 
grave,  but  rising  to  a  higher  state  of  existence.  The  anas- 
tasis  of  the  body  is  its  elevation  and  spiritualization.  By  the 
resurrection  of  the  body,  we  mean  that  in  the  future  life  of 
man,  he  shall  not  exist  in  the  same  material  and  fleshly  en- 
velope as  now,  nor  yet  as  a  purely  disembodied  spirit.  The 
true  doctrine  avoids  both  extremes  —  the  extreme  of  pure 
idealism  on  the  one  hand,  and  of  pure  materialism  on  the 
other.  It  asserts  three  things :  first,  that  we  have  a  real 
body  hereafter ;  second,  that  this  will  be  identical  with  our 
true  body  now;' third,  that  it  will  be  this  true  body  in  a 
higher  state  of  development  than  at  pi'esent,  a  spiritual  instead 
of  a  natural  body. 

First,  it  will  be  a  real  body.  A  real  body  is  an  organi- 
zation with  which  the  soul  is  connected,  and  by  means  of 
which  it  comes  into  connection  with  the  material  universe, 
and  under  the  laws  of  space  and  time.  This  organizatiou 
may  be  more  or  less  refined  and  subtle ;  it  may  not  come 
under  the  cognizance  of  our  present  senses  ;  but  if  it  is  an 
organization  by  means  of  which  we  may  commune  with  the 
physical  universe,  it  is  essentially  a  body. 

Again,  the  future  body  is  identical  with  the  present  true 
body  of  man.  For  what  is  our  true  body  ?  Not  the  particles 
of  flesh  and  blood,  but  the  principle  of  its  organization.  The 
identity  of  our  body  does  not  consist  in  the  identity  of  its 
material  particles,  for  these  come  and  go,  are  in  constant 
flux,  and  are  wholly  changed,  it  is  said,  every  seven  years. 
But,  notwithstanding  this  change,  the  body  of  the  man  is  the 
same  with  that  of  the  child.  The  same  features,  figure, 
temperament,  morbid  and  passional  tendencies,  are  repro- 
duced year  after  year.  These  flying  particles,  gathered  from 
earth  and  air,  are  manufactured  into  brain,  bone,  blood,  accord- 
ing to  an  unvarying  law,  and  then  given  back  again  to  air 
and  earth.  There  is,  therefore,  a  hidden  mysterious  princi- 
ple of  organization  working  on  during  the  whole  seventy 
27* 


318    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

years  of  our  earthly  existence,  whicli  makes  the  body  of  the 
infant  and  the  child  identical  with  that  of  the  man  and  the 
old  man.  This  is  the  true  body ;  and  this,  extricated  at 
death  from  its  present  envelope,  and  clothed  upon  with  a 
higher  spiritual  and  immortal  form,  will  constitute  the  future 
body. 

But  again,  it  will  be  a  higher  development  of  the  body. 
Paul  plainly  teaches  this.  He  uses  the  analogy  of  the  seed, 
showing  that  the  future  body  is  related  to  this,  and  differ- 
enced from  this,  as  the  plant  is  related  to  the  seed,  and  yet 
different  from  it.  "  Thou  sowest  7iot  that  body  that  shall  be, 
but  bare  grain."  You  do  not  sow  the  stalk,  but  the  kernel ; 
you  do  not  sow  the  oak,  but  the  acorn.  Yet  the  oak  is 
contained  potentially  in  the  aCorn,  and  so  the  future  body  is 
contained  potentially  in  the  present.  The  condition  of  the 
germination  of  the  acorn  is  its  dissolution  ;  then  the  germ 
is  able  to  separate  itself  from  the  rest  of  the  seed,  and  start 
forward  in  a  new  career  of  development.  In  like  manner 
the  spiritual  body  cannot  be  developed  until  the  present 
organization  is  dissolved. 

Paul  goe^  on  to  say  that  "  there  is  a  natural  body  and 
there  is  a  spiritual."  This  body  is  the  natural  body ;  the 
future  will  be  the  spiritual.  Two  things  may  be  implied 
in  this  distinction.  As  by  the  natural  body  we  come  into 
communion  with  the  natural  world,  the  world  of  phenomena, 
so  by  the  spiritual  we  commune  with  the  spiritual  world, 
the  woi'ld  of  essential  being  and  caus.e.  Mere  and  noio  we 
see  things  through  a  glass,  darkly,  then  face  to  face.  Here 
we  look  at  things  on  the  outside  only ;  but  how  often  a 
longing  seizes  us  to  know  the  essences,  to  penetrate  to  their 
interior  life  !  That  longing  is  an  instinctive  prophecy  of  its 
own  fulfilment  hereafter.  The  spiritual  body  must  also 
manifest  the  spirit  hereafter,  as  the  natural  or  soul  body 
now  manifests  the  soul.  For  while  the  present  body  ex- 
presses adequately  enough  present  wishes  and  emotions,  it 


IMMORTALITY    AND   THE   RESURRKCTION.  319 

fails  of  expressing  the  spiritual  cmotious,  aud  fails  of  being 
a  true  servant  of  the  higher  life. 

This,  then,  constitutes  the  future  body.  First,  it  is  an  or- 
ganization connecting  us  with  the  outward  universe  of  space 
and  time.  Second,  it  is  identical  with  the  present  true  body. 
Third,  it  is  a  development  aud  advance  of  this  iuto  a  higher 
ort^anization.  Let  us  now  inquire  what  are  the  evidences 
and  proofs  of  this  future  bodij.  How  do  we  know,  or  why 
do  we  think,  that  wo  shall  have  any  such  body? 

The  first  proof  of  a  future  bodily  existence  is  its  reason- 
ableness. There  is  a  law  of  gradation  in  the  universe  by 
which  the  seed  unfolds  gradually  into  the  stalk,  the  bud  into 
the  flower,  the  flower  into  the  fruit.  We  see  a  gradual  prog- 
ress of  vegetable  life  into  animal,  and  a  gradual  transition 
from  the  lower  forms  of  animal  existence  to  the  higher. 
The  transition  is  so  gradual  that  it  is  very  difficult  to  say 
where  vegetables  end  and  where  animals  begin.  Radiated 
animals  ascend  towards  the  moUusks,  the  moUusks  towards 
the  articulata,  the  articulata  towards  the  vertebrata.  Aud 
through  this  last  class  we  see  a  steady  ascent  from  one  form 
of  organization  to  another  ;  from  fishes  to  reptiles,  from  rep- 
tiles to  birds,  from  birds  to  mammalia,  until  by  steady  rise 
we  reach  the  human  body,  in  delicacy,  beauty,  and  faculty 
the  crown  of  all.  Why  should  we  suppose  this  the  end  of 
bodily  existence?  Why  not  rather  that  this  is  to  pass  into  a 
still  more  noble  and  beautiful  type  of  organization  ?  After 
this  gradual  development,  why  suppose  the  enormous  change 
to  a  purely  spiritual  existence  ?  Is  it  not  more  reasonable  to 
suppose,  instead,  a  higher  order  of  bodily  life  ? 

If  we  may  look  at  the  question  for  a  moment  from  a  meta- 
physical point  of  view,  we  shall  find  it  hard  to  comprehend 
the  possibility  of  personal  existence  hereafter  apart  from 
bodily  organization.  Everything  which  is,  must  be  either 
somewhere,  or  everywhere,  or  nowhere  ;  that  is,  it  must  be 
present  in  some  particular  point  of  space,  or  omnipresent 


320    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

through  all  space,  or  wholly  out  of  space.  But  to  be  wholly 
out  of  space  is  to  lose  that  which  distinguishes  one  thing 
from  another,  for  all  distinctions  which  we  can  conceive  of 
are  distinctions  in  space  and  time.  To  be  everywhere  is  to 
be  omnipresent,  which  is  an  attribute  belonging  to  God,  and 
not  to  finite  being,  and  would  imply  absorption  into  the  divine 
nature.  Thei-efore  personal  existence  is  existence  somewhere 
in  space,  but  locality  in  space  is  an  atti'ibute  of  body,  not  of 
spirit,  and  implies  bodily  existence. 

Moreover,  shall  we  suppose  that  after  death  we  are  to 
have  no  more  communion  Avith  the  material  universe,  no 
more  knowledge  of  this  vast  order  and  beauty,  which  is  a 
perpetual  manifestation  of  God,  the  garment  which  he  i^ears, 
one  of  his  grand  methods  of  revelation?  These  myriads  of 
suns  and  worlds,  these  constellations  of  stars  peopling  space, 
this  city  of  God  full  of  wonder  and  infinite  variety,  are  they 
to  be  nothing  to  us  after  the  few  years  of  mortal  life  are  over? 
We  cannot  believe  it.  If,  then,  we  are  still  to  perceive  the 
material  universe,  the  faculties  by  which  we  perceive  it  will 
be  more  intense  bodily  faculties.  If  spiritual  things  are 
spiritually  discerned,  bodily  things  are  discerned  in  a  bodily 
manner. 

Such  considerations  as  these  show  that  a  future  bodily  ex- 
istence is  reasonable  ;  but  the  proof  of  it  must  come,  if  at  all, 
either  from  revelation  or  experience.  Let  us  see,  then,  what 
bearing  the  resurrection  of  Jesus  has  upon  this  question. 

According  to  the  Gospels,  Jesus  rose  from  the  dead  in 
bodily  form.  This  body  resembled  his  former  one,  so  as  to  be 
recognized  by  his  disciples  ;  it  had  the  marks  of  the  spear  and 
nails  ;  it  could  be  touched,  and  was  capable  of  eating  food. 
In  all  these  respects  it  seems  exactly  the  same  body  he  had 
before.  This,  too,  is  confirmed  by  the  fact  that  he  came 
from  the  tomb  where  his  body  had  been  placed,  and  that  this 
had  disappeared.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  many  peculiari- 
ties indicate  a  difference  ;  such  as  his  not  being  recognized  at 


IMMORTALITY    AND    THE   RESURRECTION.  321 

once  by  Mary  in  the  garden,  nor  by  tlie  disciples  during  the 
whole  walk  to  Emmaus ;  his  appearing  and  disappearing 
suddenly ;  his  coming  through  the  closed  doors.  Again,  if 
the  body  of  Jesus  was  exactly  like  that  which  he  had  before 
death,  it  is  evident  that  he  would  have  to  lay  it  aside  again 
before  ascending  into  the  spiritual  world,  for  flesh  and  blood 
cannot  inherit  the  kingdom  of  God.  But  if  he  was  to  lay  it 
aside  again,  this  would  be  equivalent  to  dying  a  second  time, 
which  would  destroy  the  whole  meaning  and  value  of  his 
resurrection,  making  it  nothing  but  a  mere  revival,  or  com- 
ing to  life  again,  like  that  of  a  person  who  has  been  appar- 
ently drowned.  Such  a  revival  would  have  produced  no 
results,  and  the  faith  of  the  Church  which  has  come  from  the 
resurrection  of  Jesus  would  never  have  taken  place. 

Accordingly,  we  must  conclude  that  Jesus  rose  with  a  higher 
spiritual  body.  And  this  gives  to  the  ascension  its  meaning. 
For  otherwise,  the  ascension  would  be  only  a  disappearance ; 
whereas,  in  this  view,  the  disciples  saw  him  pass  away  in  the 
shape  and  form  he  was  to  continue  to  wear  in  the  other 
world.  Then  the  gulf  was  bridged  over,  in  their  minds, 
and  they  had  looked  into  heaven.  • 

This  was  what  the  resurrection  of  Jesus  did  for  the  apos- 
tles. It  changed  doubt  and  despair  into  faith  and  hope ; 
changed  theoretical  belief  into  practical  assurance  ;  imparted 
that  commanding  energy  of  conviction  and  utterance  which 
only  comes  from  life.  Animated  thus  themselves,  they  were 
enabled  to  animate  others.  And  so  the  resurrection  of  Christ 
was  the  resurrection  of  Christianity,  the  resurrection  of  a 
Christian  faith  and  hope  infinitely  deeper  and  stronger  than 
had  before  existed  in  the  minds  of  the  disciples.. 

We  do  not  like  the  usual  method  of  regarding  the  resur- 
rection of  Jesus  as  a  great  exceptional  event,  and  an  astound- 
ing violation  of  the  laws  of  nature.  Its  power  seems  rather 
to  have  consisted  in  this,  that  it  was  a  glorious  confirmatiou 
of  those  everlasting  laws  announced  by  Jesus  —  laws  bound' 


322    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

less  as  the  universe.  The  very  essence  of  the  gospel  is  the 
declaration  that  good  is  not  only  better  than  evil,  which  Ave 
all  knew  before,  but  stronger  than  evil,  which  we  weakly 
doubt. 

The  gospel  assures  us  that  love  is  stronger  than  hatred, 
peace  than  war,  holiness  than  evil,  truth  than  error.  It  is 
the  marriage  of  the  goodness  of  motive  and  the  goodness 
of  attainment ;  goodness  in  the  soul  and  goodness  in  outward 
life  ;  heaven  hereafter  and  heaven  here.  It  asserts  that  the 
good  man  is  always  in  reality  successful ;  that  he  who  hum- 
bles himself  is  exalted,  he  who  forgives  is  forgiven,  he  who 
gives  to  others  receives  again  himself,  he  who  hungers  after 
righteousness  is  filled.  This  was  the  faith  which  Christ  ex- 
pressed, in  which  and  out  of  which  he  lived  and  acted  ;  it  was 
this  faith  which  made  him  Christ  the  King,  King  of  human 
minds  and  hearts.  Was  it  then  all  false  ?  Did  his  death  prove 
it  so  ?  "Was  that  the  end,  the  earthly  end,  of  his  efforts  for 
man  ?  "Were  truth  and  love  struck  down  then  by  the  power  of 
darkness?  That  was  the  question  which  his  resurrection  an- 
swered ;  it  showed  him  passing  through  death  to  higher  life, 
through  an  apparent  overthrow  to  a  real  triumph  ;  it  gave 
one  visible  illustration  to  laws  usually  invisible  in  their  oper- 
ation, and  set  God's  seal  to  their  truth.  Through  that  death 
which  seemed  the  destruction  of  all  hope,  Jesus  went  up  to 
be  the  Christ,  the  King. 

In  this  point  of  view  Ave  see  the  value  and  importance  of 
the  resurrection  of  Jesus,  and  why  Easter  Sunday  should  be 
the  chief  festival  of  Christianity.  It  was  the  great  triumph 
of  life  over  death,  of  good  over  evil.  It  Avas  the  apt  symbol 
and  illustration  ot  the  Avhole  gospel. 

If,  then,  the  resurrection  of  Christ  means  that  Christ  as- 
cended through  death  to  a  higher  state ;  if  our  resurrection 
means  that  we  pass  up  through  death,  and  not  down ; 
not  into  the  grave,  but  into  a  condition  of  higher  life  ;  if  the 
resurrection  of  the  body  does  not  mean  the  raising  again  out 


IMMORTALITY    AND   THE   RESURRECTION.  323 

of  the  earth  the  material  particles  deposited  there,  but  the 
soul  clothing  itself  with  a  higher  and  more  perfect  organiza- 
tion ;  if  it  is,  then,  the  raising  of  the  body  to  a  more  perfect 
condition  of  development,  —  then  is  there  not  good  reason 
why  such  stress  should  be  hud  upon  this  great  fact? 

All  the  pi'oof  rests  on  the  historic  fact  of  the  resurrection. 
Was  Christ  seen  in  this  higher  spiritual  and  bodily  state,  or 
was  he  not?  If  he  was,  then  we  have  a  fact  of  history  and 
experience  to  rely  upon  to  show  us  that  the  future  life  in- 
volves an  ascent  both  spiritual  and  bodily.  And  this  is  the 
reason  why  such  stress  has  been  laid  on  the  resurrection. 

This  raising  of  man,  through  the  power  of  Christ's  life,  to 
a  higher  state,  is  not  a  mere  matter  of  speculatiou,  then,  not 
an  opinion,  not  something  pleasant  to  think  of  and  hope  for, 
but  it  is  a  fundamental  fact  of  Christian  faith.  Because 
Christ  has  arisen  and  passed  up,  we  must  all  arise  and  pass 
up,  too,  with  him.  He  is  the  first  fruits  of  those  who  sleep. 
In  proportion  as  the  Spirit  of  Christ  is  in  us,  in  that  propor- 
tion is  the  power  in  us  which  shall  carry  us  upward  towards 
him.  He  wishes  that  those  who  believe  in  him  shall  be 
where  he  is.  We  shall  belong  to  him  and  to  his  higher 
world,  not  arbitrarily,  but  naturally ;  not  by  any  positive 
decree  of  God,  but  by  the  nature  of  things. 

The  essential  fact  in  the  resurrection  is,  that  Christ  i-ose, 
through  death,  to  a  higher  state.  The  essential  doctrine  of 
the  resurrection  is,  that  death  is  the  transition  from  a  lower 
to  a  higher  condition  in  all  who  have  the  life  which  makes 
them  capable  of  it. 


324         orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 


CHAPTER    XIII. 

CHRIST'S  COMING,  USUALLY  CALLED  THE  "SECOND  COMING," 
AND  CHRIST  THE  JUDGE  OF  THE  WORLD, 

§  1.  The  Coming  of  Christ  is  not  tvhoUy  future,  not  loholly 
outiuard,  not  local,  nor  material.  —  It  is  a  curious  fact  that, 
in  direct  contradiction  to  Christ's  own  explanations  concern- 
ing his  coming,  this  should  frequently  be  considered  by  the 
Orthodox,  (1.)  as  wholly  future  ;  (2.)  as  wholly  outward ; 
(3.)   as  local ;   (4.)   as  bodily  and  material. 

It  cannot  be  wholly  future,  for  if  it  were,  Jesus  was  mis- 
taken in  saying  of  the  signs  of  his  coming,  "  This  generation 
shall  not  pass  away  until  all  these  things  be  fulfilled." 
(Mark  13:30.) 

Nor  can  it  be  wholly  outward,  for  if  it  were,  Jesus  was 
mistaken  when  he  declared  of  the  signs  of  his  coming,  "  The 
kingdom  of  God  cometh  not  with  observation"  (Luke  17: 
20)  ;  "  The  kingdom  of  God  is  within  you"  (Luke  17  :  21)  ; 
".My  kingdom  is  not  of  this  world"  (John  18:36).  See 
also  Mark  4:26,  27,  and  Matt.  13:33,  where  his  king- 
dom is  compared  with  seed  sprouting  and  leaven  working 
secretly. 

Nor  is  Christ's  coming  local,  that  is,  in  a  certain  place,  for 
if  it  were,  Jesus  was  mistaken  in  telling  his  disciples  not  to 
believe  those  who  said,  "  Lo,  here  !  "  or  "  Lo,  there  !  "  not  to 
go  into  the^  desert  when  men  say,  "  Behold,  he  is  there," 
and  not  to  believe  those  who  declare  that  he  is  hidden  some- 
where in  the  city,  for  that  the  coming  of  the  Son  of  man 
should  be  like  that  of  the  lightning,  which  shines  all  round 
the  sky,  and  seems  to  be  everywhere  at  once.     (Matt.  24  :  26.) 


SECOND   COMING    OF   CHRIST   AS   JUDGE.  325 

And  if  not  local,  neither  can  it  be  a  bodily  coming  ;  for  all 
bodily  coming  must  be  in  some  one  place.  Since,  therefore, 
Jesus  distinctly  denies  that  his  coming  is  to  be  "here"  or 
"  there,"  —  that  is,  local,  —  it  must  be  a  spiritual  coming,  a 
coming  in  spirit  and  in  power.  All  the  material  images  con- 
nected wita  it — the  clouds,  the  trumpet,  &c.  —  are  to  be  con- 
sidered symbolical.  The  "  clouds  of  heaven  "  may  symbolize 
spiritual  movements  and  influences ;  the  "  trumpet,"  the 
awakening  power  of  new  truth.* 

§  2.  No  Second  Coming  of  Christ  is  mentioned  in  Scripture. 
—  It  is  also  a  remarkable  fact  that  only  one  coming  of  Christ 
is  mentioned  in  the  New  Testament.  Orthodoxy  speaks  con- 
tinually of  Christ's  second  coming,  but  without  any  warrant. 
It  assumes  that  the  manifestation  of  Jesus  in  the  flesh  was 
his  first  coming  as  the  Christ,  and  that  consequently  the  pre- 
dictions (in  Matt.  ch.  24,  and  the  parallels)  must  refer  to  a 
second  coming.  Hence  the  phrase  "second  coming"  has 
been  introduced,  and  naturalized  in  theology.  But,  in  truth, 
the  life  of  Jesus  on  earth  was  not  regarded  as  his  coming  as 
the  Messiah. I  What  the  disciples  expected  was  his  manifes- 
tation or  investiture  as  the  Messiah,  which  evidently  had  not 
taken  place  at  the  time  of  their  conversation.  And  this  was 
to  be,  not  "  at  the  end  of  the  world,"  but  at  the  end  of  the 
age.  They,  like  other  Jews,  divided  time  into  two  periods, 
"  the  present  age,"  or  times  previous  to  the  Messiah,  and 
"  the  coming  age,"  or  times  of  the  Messiah's  reign.  "When, 
therefore,  Jesus  Avas  with  them,  only  teaching  and  healing, 
they  did  not  at  all  consider  him  to  have  come  as  the  Messiah. 
But  when  he  spoke  of  the  destruction  of  the  Temple,  as  that 

*  So  Dsteri  (Paulinischen  Lehrbeg^ff)  says  that  (rdATrivf  appears  to  denote 
partly  the  startling  power  of  the  truth,  and  partly  its  power  of  calling  men 
together  from  all  the  regions  of  the  earth. 

t  Christ  only  comes  when  he  comes  to  reign.  His  first  coming  was  as  Jesus, 
not  as  Christ.  The  human  life  is  "  the  life  of  Jesus."  Christian  history  is  "  the 
life  of  Christ."  In  his  earthly  life  he  was  Prophet;  in  his  death  he  was  Priest; 
In  his  resurrection,  or  risen  state,  he  was  King. 

28 


326  ORTHODOXY  :    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

indicated  the  end  of  the  existing  economy,  they  understood  it 
to  be  synchronous  with  his  coming  as  the  Christ.  So  they 
said,  "  What  shall  be  the  sign  of  thy  coming,  and  of  the  end 
OF  THE  AGE?"  And  SO  through  the  Epistles,  when  the 
"  coming  of  Christ "  is  spoken  of,  is  meant  his  manifestation 
in  the  world  as  the  Messiah.  This  was  a  single  event,  to 
take  place  once,  not  to  be  repeated.  Such  a  thing  as  "  Christ's 
second  coming  "  is  unknown  to  the  Scriptures.* 

§  3.  Were  the  Apostles  mistaken  in  expecting  a  speedy  Com- 
ing of  Christ  ?  —  It  is  often  said  that  the  apostles  themselves 
were  mistaken  in  expecting  a  speedy  coming  of  Christ.  No 
doubt  they  did  expect  his  speedy  coming,  and  with  reason ; 
for  he  himself  had  told  them  that  the  existing  generation 
should  not  pass  away  till  all  those  things  were  fulfilled. 
Therefore  they  were  justified  in  looking  for  a  near  coming 
of  Jesus  as  the  Christ.  We  admit  that  they  expected  his 
speedy  coming  ;  but  we  think  they  were  not  mistaken,  for  he 
did  come.  He  came,  though  not  perhaps  in  the  manner  they 
anticipated.  Possibly  they  interpreted  too  literally  what  he 
said  concerning  his  coming. 

For  though  Christ  spoke  so  much  in  symbols  and  parables, 
literal  people  took  him  literally.  And  so  they  do  still.  When 
he  said  that  except  men  ate  his  flesh  and  drank  his  blood  they 
could  not  be  his,  the  literalists  said,  "  Sow  can  this  man  give 
us  his  flesh  to  eat  ?  "  And  so  many  persons  still  think  that 
somehow  Christ's  actual  body  is  to  be  eaten  in  the  Lord's 
supper.     So,  when  he  said  that  the  Son  of  man  should  be 

*  The  book  of  the  Revelation  of  John  is  the  account  of  Christ's  coming; 
and  the  true  interpretation  of  that  book  depends  on  the  proper  understanding 
of  his  comin<^.  If  Christ's  coming'  began  at  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem, 
and  has  continued  in  all  the  developments  of  human  history,  then  the  key 
to  "  the  Revelation "  is  to  be  found  in  the  progress  of  Christian  principles 
and  ideas  in  the  vrorld.  Bertholdt  (Christologia  Judseorum  Jesu  Apostolo- 
rumque  a»tate),  note  to  §  11,  quotes  from  the  Sepher  Ikkarim  thi&  passage- 
"  The  future  age  will  come  gradually  to  men  after  the  day  of  the  great  judg- 
ment, which  will  take  place  after  the  resurrection."  Resurrection  and  judgment 
both  come  with  Jesus,  and  his  were  "  the  last  days." 


SECOND   COMING    OP   CHRIST    AS   JUDGE.  327 

seen  "  coming  in  the  clouds  of  heaven  with  power  and  great 
glory,  and  send  his  angels  with  the  sound  of  a  trumpet,  and 
gather  his  elect  from  the  four  winds,"  they  took  it  literally. 
His  apostles,  even,  may  have  supposed  that  he  was  to  be  seen 
up  in  the  air  in  physical  form,*  and  that  a  material  trumpet 
was  to  be  blown.  But  all  this  was  the  flesh,  the  garb  of  his 
thought.  The  spirit  of  his  thought  only  is  of  value  ;  the 
flesh  profits  nothing.  The  apostles  were  wrong  in  suppos- 
ing —  if  they  did  suppose  it  —  that  Christ  was  to  come  in  their 
day  in  the  air,  in  an  outward  physical  fashion,  with  an  out- 
ward noise,  making  a  great  demonstration  to  the  senses  of 
sight  and  hearing.  Christ  never  came  so,  and  he  never  will 
come  so.  The  only  coming  of  Christ  possible  is  spiritual 
coming,  for  Christ  is  spirit.  He  did  come,  therefore,  in 
the  days  of  the  apostles,  in  the  great  access  of  faith  and  power 
in  their  own  souls,  and  in  the  souls  of  those  whom  they  con- 
verted. He  came  in  poAver  and  great  glory,  when  his  truth 
came  to  human  minds,  and  his  love  to  human  hearts.  He 
sent  his  angels  then,  and  gathered  his  elect  from  the  four 
quarters  of  the  heavens.  When  Paul  was  converted,  Christ 
came  to  him ;  when  the  negro  chamberlain  of  the  Queen  of 
Ethiopia  was  converted,  Christ  came  to  him  ;  when  the  peo- 
ple of  Ephesus  and  Corinth,  Philippi  and  Rome,  were  con- 
verted, Christ  came  to  them.  The  trumpet  sounded,  but  it 
was  in  their  souls  that  it  sounded ;  the  angels  summoned  the 
elect,  but  these  angels  were  the  convictions  sent  into  their 
reason,  and  the  longings  awakened  in  their  hearts. 

Materialists  and  Literalists  are  always  the  same.  The 
apostles  soon  rose  out  of  their  literalism,  and  soon  spoke  of 
Christ  as  being  revealed  within  them,  not  outside  of  them ; 

*  1  These.  4 :  17.  "  We,  who  arc  alive,  and  remain,  shall  be  caught  up  togeth- 
er with  them,  in  the  clouds,  to  meet  the  Lord  in  the  air."'  Usteri  (Paul. 
Lehrbeg.)  says  that  "  this  iij  dioa  has  no  analogy  in  any  other  passage  of  the 
Epistles,  or  indeed  of  the  New  Testament."  But  Paul  outgrew  this  literalism, 
and  in  his  later  Epistles  speaks  of  sitting  already  with  Christ  in  "  heavenly 
places." 


828    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

dwelling,  not  in  the  air,  but  in  their  hearts.  But  literal- 
ists,  down  to  this  day,  have  always  imagined  the  coming 
of  Christ  to  be  to  the  senses,  rather  than  to  the  soul.  They 
do  not  see  that  a  great  noise  in  the  air  is  not  so  glorious 
a  thing  as  a  voice  heard  in  the  depths  of  the  heart,  and  a 
great  outward  conflagration  somehow  seems  to  them  more 
imposing  than  the  burning  up  of  falsehood  and  sin  in  the 
world.  So  we  are  always  hearing  people  predict  that  Christ 
is  to  come  in  1846,  or  1856,  or  1866,  meaning  thereby  that 
they  expect  some  gi'eat  outward  event  then,  visible  to  eyes  and 
ears.  "  Fools,  and  slow  of  heart,"  not  to  see  that  the  only 
possible  coming  of  Him  who  is  spirit  and  love  is  a  coming  in 
the  soul,  and  that  he  has  come,  and  is  coming,  and  is  to  come 
more  and  more  abundantly,  from  day  to  day.  So  they  read 
about  the  heavens  and  earth  being  burned  up,  and  of  a  new 
heavens  and  earth ;  and  they  imagine  that  the  sky  is  some- 
how to  be  burned  with  material  fire,  and  the  surface  of  the 
earth  to  sink  into  the  flaming  abyss  beneath  us.  But  if  this 
should  happen,  that  would  have  nothing  to  do  with  the  com- 
ing of  Christ.  The  heavens  and  earth  which  he  consumes 
with  the  breath  of  his  mouth,  and  destroys  with  the  bright- 
ness of  his  coming,  are  the  religions  and  moralities,  the  in- 
stitutions and  works,  of  men.  And  the  new  heavens  and  new 
earth  which  take  their  place  are  the  higher,  nobler,  purer  re- 
ligions and  moralities  which  flow  out  of  the  Spirit  of  Christ. 
§  4.  Examinatioyi  of  the  Account  of  Christ's  Coming  given 
by  Jesus  in  Matthew  (chapters  24-26). — A  great  difficulty 
in  regard  to  the  coming  of  Christ  is  to  combine  in  one 
view  the  different  notions  given  in  Scripture  concerning  it. 
Many  of  these  ideas  indicate  that  the  coming  of  Christ  took 
place  at  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem,  as,  for  example,  the 
description  of  wars,  destruction  of  the  Temple,  and  especially 
the  declaration  that  "this  generation  shall  not  pass  away  till 
all  these  things  be  fulfilled."  On  the  other  hand,  the  coming 
of  Christ  is  expressly  connected,  in  our  translation,  with  "the 


SECOND   COMING    OP   CHRIST   AS   JUDGE.  829 

end  of  the  world,"  aud  with  the  general  judgmeut.  Hence  a 
difliculty  in  interpreting  these  passages,  some  persons  think- 
ing that  the  coming  of  Christ  took  place  at  the  destruction  of 
Jerusalem ;  otliers  thinking  that  it  is  yet  to  take  place  at  the 
end  of  the  world ;  others,  again,  maintaining  two  or  more 
comings  of  Christ ;  and  others  spiritualizing  the  whole  of  it, 
and  making  it  mean  the  spread  of  the  spirit  of  Christianity. 

Let  us,  therefore,  examine  the  passage  in  which  Christ's 
coming  is  spoken  of,  and  endeavor  to  find  its  natural  and 
obvious  meaning,  and  so  see  how  far  the  common  Orthodox 
conception  is  correct. 

The  subject  is  not  unimportant.  Several  chapters  in  the 
Gospel  of  Matthew  (24-26)  are  devoted  to  the  description  of 
this  event.  All  of  the  Epistles  contain  frequent  allusions  to 
it.  The  apostles  unquestionably  expected  Christ's  coming  in 
their  day,  and  they  had  a  riglit  to  do  so,  inasmuch  as  Jesus 
himself  had  distinctly  said  that  their  generation  would  not 
pass  away  till  all  was  fulfilled.  And  in  the  main  fact  they 
were  not  mistaken,  however  they  may  have  been  deceived, 
as  we  have  before  said,  in  taking  too  outward  a  view  of  the 
attending  circumstances.  For  if  Christ's  coming  did  not  take 
place  in  their  day,  not  only  were  they  themselves  mistaken 
on  a  most  important  point,  but  Jesus  was  mistaken  likewise. 

Some  of  the  other  points  in  the  description  of  this  event 
are  these :  Christ's  coming  was  to  be  like  that  of  the  thief 
in  the  night  —  that  is,  it  was  to  be  unexpected,  and  to  take 
men  unprepared.  It  was  to  be  preceded  by  wars,  commo- 
tions, and  misery  in  every  form  ;  preceded  also  by  the  pi'each- 
iug  of  the  truth  in  many  lands.  It  was  to  be  as  difficult  to 
locate  Christ  at  his  coming,  as  to  fix  the  lightning,  which 
comes  out  of  the  east  and  shines  to  the  west.  It  was  to  be 
attended  with  great  spiritual  darkness,  even  in  the  minds  of 
the  wise  and  good.  The  sun,  and  moon,  and  stars  of  the  moral 
world  were  to  be  darkened,  and  the  powers  of  the  heavens  to 
be  shaken;  aud  of  ten  virgins,  all  going  together/to  meet 
28* 


330    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

the  bridegroom,  half  would  be  found  spiritually  asleep  when 
he  came.  Christ's  coming  would  be  especially  judgme  it  and 
punishment.  He  would  part  the  sheep  from  the  goats.  He 
would  consume  with  the  brightness  of  his  coming  the  man  of 
sin.  Such  are  some  of  the  traits  with  which  the  coming 
of  Jesus  is  described  by  himself  and  by  his  apostles.  How 
are  these  to  be  reconciled  with  the  facts,  and  what  was  his 
coming  ? 

The  best  way  to  get  at  the  facts  is  to  begin  at  the  begin- 
ning, and  ask  what  the  disciples  meant  when  they  asked  for  the 
signs  of  Christ's  coming.  They  were  sitting  with  Jesus  on 
the  Mount  of  Olives,  looking  across  the  valley  between,  at 
the  Temple.  They  saw  and  admired  the  gorgeous  magnifi- 
cence of  this  vast  edifice  towering  before  them,  white  with 
marble  and  yellow  with  gold,  against  the  deep  blue  sky  of 
that  sunny  land,  and  as  they  admired  it,  Jesus  told  them  that 
every  stone  of  that  divine  structure  should  be  cast  down. 
And  then  they  asked,  "  When  shall  these  things  be?  and  what 
shall  be  the  signs  of  thy  coming,  and  of  the  end  of  the  world  ?  " 
What  was  the  connection,  in  their  minds,  between  the  three 
events?  Why  should  they  have  at  once  inferred  that  the 
destruction  of  the  Temple  was  to  take  place  at  the  coming 
of  Christ,  and  that  the  coming  of  Christ  was  to  take  place  at 
the  end  of  the  world  ?  There  was  no  connection  at  all,  accord- 
ing to  the  common  notions  on  this  subject.  If  the  coming 
of  Christ  was  to  be  a  great  outward  manifestation  in  the  sky, 
to  take  place  long  after  his  death,  after  the  lapse  of  thousands 
of  years,  and  at  the  destruction  of  the  visible  universe,  what 
had  that  to  do  with  the  Jewish  Temple?  or,  indeed,  what 
had  that  to  do  with  any  of  their  ideas  concerning  their  Mas- 
ter? But  the  notion  in  their  minds,  when  they  asked  the 
question,  was  something  very  different ;  not  the  present 
Christian  idea,  but  the  usual  Jewish  idea.  They  spoke  as 
Jews,  out  of  the  notions  of  their  day.  Christ  answered  what 
was  in  their  minds,  not  what  is  in  ours.     If  we  wish  to  know 


SECOND    COMING   OF   CHRIST   AS   JUDGE.  331 

what  he  meant,  we  must  place  ourselves  on  their  stand-point, 
look  out  of  their  eyes,  and  listen  with  their  ears. 

The  coming  of  Christ  had  a  very  distinct  meaning  to  the 
Jewish  mind.  It  meant  the  manifestation  of  the  Messiah,  as 
such.  It  meant  his  coming  to  reign  as  king.  It  meant  his 
mauitcstation  in  Judea,  in  Jerusalem,  as  the  great  Son  of 
David ;  and  the  submission  of  the  Jews,  and  Gentiles  with 
them,  to  his  authority.  The  disciples  of  Jesus,  believing 
him  to  be  the  Clirist,  believed  that  he  was  to  come  as  such. 
He  had  come  as  Prophet,  as  Teacher,  as  a  worker  of  benef- 
icent miracles,  but  he  had  not  yet  come  as  Christ,  as  King. 
They  were  not  asking  about  any  second  coming  after  his 
death  and  resurrection,  for  they  did  not  believe  that  he  was 
to  die.  They  were  asking  for  his  present  triumphant  mani- 
festation and  investiture  as  the  Messiah. 

Nor  were  they  asking  —  as  our  translators  make  them  ask 
—  for  "the  end  of  the  world."  But  they  were  asking  for 
the  end  of  the  age  —  that  is,  of  the  first  age.  We  have  said 
that  the  Jews  divided  all  time  into  two  great  periods ;  one 
the  age  preceding  the  Messiah,  the  other  the  age  of  the  Mes- 
siah. The  first  was  called  this  age,  or  the  present  age  ;  the 
other  the  coming  age.  The  end  of  the  first  period  and  be- 
ginning of  the  second  were  called  the  ends  of  the  age ;  as 
where  Paul  says,  "  These  are  written  for  our  admonition, 
upon  whom  the  ends  of  the  world  are  come ; "  and  where 
he  says  that  Christ  has  "  now  once  appeared  in  the  end  of 
the  world  to  put  away  sin."  These  were  the  ideas  of  the 
Jew's,  as  we  knoAv  from  history.  When,  therefore,  Christ 
spoke  of  the  overthrow  of  the  Temple,  they  inferred  that  he 
was  speaking  of  the  beginning  of  the  Messianic  age ;  since 
the  Temple  would  not  be  overthrown  while  the  Jewish  theo- 
cratic and  Levitical  government  continued.  Now,  as  the 
Jewish  age  did  come  to  an  end  at  the  destruction  of  Jerusa- 
lem, and  Christianity,  as  the  universal  religion,  took  the 
place   of   Judaism   in   the    education    of  the    human  race, 


332         orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

this  really  was  the  coming  of  the  Messiah  and  the  end  of 
the  age. 

"We  understand,  therefore,  Christ  to  have  been  really  speak- 
ing of  his  coming,  as  an  event  soon  to  take  place,  and  which 
did  soon  take  place,  when,  at  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem, 
the  Jewish  Christians  were  scattered  thi'ough  the  world,  and 
Christianity  took  its  place  as  a  universal  religion.*  If  this 
exhausted  the  meaning  of  the  idea,  it  would  be  of  very  little 
interest  to  us.  But  the  contents  of  the  passage  are  more  rich 
and  full ;  and,  like  most  of  Christ's  sayings,  besides  its  pres- 
ent and  immediate  application,  it  has  more  universal  and 
far-reaching  meanings.     The  principles  of  Christianity  which 

*  Olshausen,  an  Orthodox  commentator,  speaks  thus  in  regard  to  Christ's 
predictions  concerning  his  coming,  in  Matt.  ch.  24,  25 :  — 

"  One  of  the  most  striking  examples  of  the  blending  of  the  present  and  future 
in  one  narrative,  and  one  which  presents  many  difficulties,  is  to  be  found  in 
these  passages.  Plain  descriptions  of  the  impending  destruction  of  Jerusalem 
and  of  the  Jewish  state  blend  with  no  less  apparent  descriptions  of  the  coming 
of  Christ  in  his  kingdom.  It  cannot  be  denied  that  the  Orthodox  interpreters 
are  far  less  natural  and  unforced  than  the  others,  in  their  treatment  of  this  pas- 
sage. Their  dogmatic  views  lead  them  to  put  apart  from  each  other  elements 
which  are' blended  together  by  Matthew  and  by  the  other  evangelists.  For 
example,  Schott  says,  that  the  description  of  Christ's  coming  begins  (Matt.  24: 
29)  immediately  after  'the  tribulation,'  &c.,  and  that  all  before  that  belongs 
to  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem.  But  apart  from  the  impossibihty  of  regarding 
the  29th  verse  as  the  beginning  of  something  entirely  new,  there  are  also  in 
the  passages  which  follow  distinct  references  to  the  present  generation  (verse 
34),  and  in  the  first  part  as  distinct  references  to  'the  last  time.'  We  do  not, 
therefore,  scruple  (says  Olshausen)  to  accept  the  simple  explanation  which 
alone  suits  the  text,  that  Christ  speaks  of  his  coming  as  coincident  with  the 
destruction  of  Jerusalem,  and  with  the  downfall  of  the  Jewish  state." 

The  most  interesting  question,  perhaps,  is  as  to  the  opinions  of  Jesus  himself 
about  his  coming.  That  he  foresaw  the  overthrow  of  Jerusalem  and  the  Tem- 
ple is  certain.  Everything  indicates  that  he  possessed  a  marvellous  power  of 
reading  the  future  in  the  present,  and  saw  in  the  condition  of  the  Jewish 
mind  the  inevitable  overthrow  of  their  state.  He  also  saw  that  through  his 
death  all  men  should  be  brought  to  him,  and  that  he  should  become  King  in  the 
way  in  which  he  described  to  Pilate  his  royalty,  i.  e..  King  of  the  trutli.  AH 
who  love  the  truth  shall,  sooner  or  later,  obey  his  voice.  In  what  way,  then, 
did  he  expect  to  come .'  In  the  way  he  himself  indicates  the  coming  of  his 
kingdom  —  like  leaven,  working  secretly  in  the  dough;  like  seed,  sprouting 
mysteriously  in  the  ground ;  like  lightning,  seen  everywhere  at  once.  By 
these  images  alone  could  he  convey  to  his  disciples  his  ideas.  He  longed  to  teli 
them  many  things  more,  but  tlioy  were  not  able  to  bear  them. 


SECOND    COMING    OF   CHRIST   AS   JUDGE.  333 

were  manifested  then,  continue  to  be  manifested  in  other 
forms  to-day.  Jesus  said  on  one  occasion,  "  The  hour  is 
coming,  and  now  is,  when  all  that  are  in  their  graves  shall 
hear  the  voice  of  the  Son  of  man."  And  on  another  occa- 
sion, "  The  hour  is  coming,  and  now  is,  when  the  true  wor- 
shippers shall  worship  the  Father."  The  hour  had  come  in 
its  first  manifestation,  but  was  to  come  again  in  other  and 
richer  manifestations  of  the  same  principle.  So  Christ  himself 
came  as  King  at  the  taking  of  Jerusalem,  but  has  come  since, 
again  and  again,  more  plainly  aud  fully,  in  other  triumphs 
of  his  truth,  in  other  manifestations  of  his  power. '  "We  be- 
lieve that  the  coming  of  Christ  took  place  at  the  destruction 
of  Jerusalem.  We  believe  that  it  has  taken  place  since,  in 
other  historical  events.  We  believe  that  it  is  to  take  place 
more  fully  hereafter,  in  this  life  and  in  the  other  life. 

Let  us  look  and  consider  how  this  may  be. 

§  5.  Coming  of  Christ  in  Human  History  at  different 
Times. — As  we  look  back  through  the  eighteen  centuries 
of  Christian  history,  we  can  observe  many  events  which  may 
now  be  seen  to  have  been  each  a  coming  of  Christ.  When, 
at  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem,  the  Mosaic  theocracy  went 
down  before  the  iron  power  of  Rome,  amid  those  scenes  of 
horror  the  firmest  believers  in  Christ  might  have  feared  only 
evil.  It  seemed  to  be  the  overthrow  of  everything  most 
sacred  —  the  triumph  of  Paganism  over  the  worship  of  Je- 
hovah. Yet  what  was  the  result?  Jesus  then  ceased  to  be 
the  Jewish  Messiah,  and  began  to  reign  over  all  nations  as 
the  world-teacher,  the  Son  of  God,  the  prophet  for  mankind. 
Since  then,  more  and  more,  the  world  has  gone  to  him  as  to 
its  great  Master.     This,  therefore,  was  a  coming  of  Christ. 

Look  again.  The  early  centuries  are  disgraced  with  theo- 
logical wars.  Fierce  conflicts  are  carried  on  about  the  Trin- 
ity, and  the  rank  of  Jesus  in  the  universe.  All  regard  for  the 
pure,  divine  truth  of  Christianity  seems  forgotten  in  the  fury 
of  these   controversies.     Yet,    nevertheless,   amid    all    the 


334    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

absurdity  and  contradiction,  one  truth  emerges,  everywhere 
recognized  —  that  in  Jesus  was  something  divine  ;  that  God 
was  more  fully  manifest  in  him  than  elsewhere ;  that  he  is 
the  moral  image  of  the  Infinite  One.  This  is  another  com- 
ing of  Christ.  He  comes  now  not  merely  as  a  prophet,  but 
as  the  revealer  of  divine  love  and  truth,  in  his  own  charac- 
ter. The  theological  doctrines,  in  which  this  truth  has  been 
wrapped,  are  the  husks  and  shells  which  the  world  will 
throw  away.  But  throughout  Christendom  the  idea  of  God 
is  derived  from  the  character  of  Jesus,  and  in  this  way 
Jesus  has  come  to  rule  the  hearts  of  men  as  their  divine 
King. 

Other  centuries  passed  by,  and  we  find  new  and  strange 
ideas  taking  possession  of  men's  minds.  A  horror  of  life,  a 
dread  of  the  sins  of  the  world,  drive  men  into  the  desert, 
to  live  as  hermits  and  anchorites.  Thousands  and  tens  of 
thousands  of  monks  withdrew  from  the  world  into  the  wil- 
derness. All  Christianity  appeared  to  be  changing  into  a 
new  form  of  heathenish,  self-inflicted  torture.  Its  blessed 
humanity,  its  genial  influences  on  social  life,  seemed  to  be 
fast  disappearing.  Nevertheless,  out  of  all  this  error  one 
truth  emerged,  one  Christian  idea  was  developed  —  that  of  self- 
discipline  and  self-culture.  And  in  the  development  of  this 
idea  Christ  came  to  reign  over  the  individual  soul  as  its  Mas- 
ter, Guide,  and  Redeemer  from  all  sin. 

After  this  arose  the  Papacy.  The  Church,  as  a  powerful 
institution,  became  ambitious  to  rule  the  state  and  the  world. 
A  spiritual  despotism  appeared,  surrounding  itself  with  earth- 
ly splendor,  grasping  the  sword  of  earthly  power,  and  the 
farthest  removed  from  the  humble  and  gentle  spirit  of  its 
Master.  It  would  tolerate  no  opposition  to  its  will,  in  high 
places  or  low.  It  hurled  its  thunders  at  the  head  of  kings, 
and  sent  crusading  armies  to  persecute  and  torture  the  peas- 
ants of  the  Piedmont  valleys.  Nothing  could  seem  more 
full  of  the  spirit  of  Antichrist  than  this  spiritual  despotism 


SECOND   COMING   OF   CHRIST   AS   JUDGE.  335 

embodied  ia  the  Papacy.  And  yet,  evcu  through  this  evil 
there  was  developed  a  truth  —  that  there  was  something  in  the 
world  higher  than  kings,  greater  than  the  state.  Papacy, 
with  all  its  evils,  was  a  standing  proof,  in  an  age  of  brute 
force,  of  the  supremacy  of  mind  over  matter.  So  that,  even 
here,  the  pride  and  selfishness  of  the  priests  and  the  popes 
have  been  overruled,  in  the  providence  of  God,  to  give  as- 
cendency to  a  Christian  idea,  and  to  cause  Christ  to  come  as 
the  King  of  the  world. 

Consider  another  important  event  in  the  history  of  Europe  : 
the  conversion  of  the  barbarous  tribes  to  Christianity.  When 
the  nations  of  the  north  poured  from  the  forests  of  Germany 
and  the  deserts  of  Scandinavia  over  the  Roman  empire,  — 
when  Goths  and  Vandals,  Franks,  Lombards,  and  Normans, 
quenched  the  light  of  civilization  and  brought  the  dark  ages 
over  Europe,  —  how  terrible  seemed  the  gloom,  and  how  hope- 
less the  prospects,  of  the  human  race  !  But  we  now  see  the 
result  in  modern  civilization.  We  see  all  these  different  na- 
tions subdued  by  the  power  of  Christianity,  and  a  new  unity, 
a  higher  harmony,  as  the  result.  We  see  the  great  idea  of 
the  unity  of  the  race,  the  harmony  of  nations,  resulting  from 
all  this  darkness  and  misery.  So  Christ  has  come  again  as 
the  Prince  of  Peace,  breaking  down  the  partition  walls,  and 
proclaiming  a  brotherhood  of  man. 

Let  us  look  at  one  more  event  of  history  —  the  Lutheran 
Reformation.  What  evils  attended  it !  What  wars  came 
out  of  it !  How  has  the  impulse  to  freedom  given  by 
Luther  degenerated  into  licentiousness,  run  out  in  infidelity 
and  unbelief!  And  yet,  when  we  consider  the  ideas  of  per- 
sonal responsibility  and  individual  independence  which  have 
been  born  of  it,  —  when  we  consider  what  an  impulse  it  has 
given  to  thought,  to  free  inquiry,  to  earnest  investigation  of 
truth,  all  the  results  of  this  fruitful  principle,  —  we  cannot 
doubt  that  this  also  was  a  coming  of  Jesus,  tl»«  unfolding  o£ 
a  new  and  higher  power  in  Christianity. 


836    orthodoxy;  its  truths  and  errors. 

Thus  has  Christ  come  from  age  to  age,  and  in  the  midst 
of  apparent  failure,  increasing  error,  growing  unbelief,  and 
all  forms  of  human  wickedness,  has  acquired  new  power  over 
the  human  mind.  At  the  present  day  he  is  more  the  King 
of  the  world  than  ever.  When  he  seems  to  go,  then  he 
comes.  When  iniquity  most  abounds,  then  he  is  nearest. 
When  love  grows  cold  in  the  hearts  of  his  disciples,  then  a 
new  impulse  of  faith  is  about  to  be,  given.  When  false 
prophets  rise  up  and  deceive  many,  then  new  champions  of 
the  truth  are  near  at  hand.  Christ  comes  amid  wars  and 
persecutions.  He  comes  unexpectedly,  like  the  thief  in  the 
night ;  comes  without  observation  ;  and  while  men  say,  "  Lo, 
heie  !  "  and  "  Lo,  there  !  "  the  kingdom  of  heaven  is  in  the 
midst  of  them.  He  is  not  to  be  found  in  the  desert,  nor  in 
the  secret  chambers  ;  neither  in  public  nor  private  ;  located 
neither  in  this  nor  that  particular  place  ;  incarnate  neither  in 
this  nor  that  particular  person.  But  Christ  comes  like  the 
lightning,  seen  over  the  whole  heaven  at  once,  in  a  new  spirit 
pervading  all  parts  of  life,  all  parts  of  society. 

§  6.  Relation  of  the  Parable  of  the  Virgins^  and  of  the 
Talents,  to  Christ's  Coming.  —  We  now  see  what  is  meant  by 
the  parable  of  the  foolish  and  wise  virgins,  and  of  the  talents, 
which  follows  it.  We  see  their  application  to  this  descrip- 
tion of  Christ's  coming.  If  the  coming  of  Christ  be  thus 
unexpected,  he  will  not  be  recognized  by  the  sleeping  servant, 
nor  by  those  who  beat  their  fellow-servants.  Slothful  Chris- 
tians who  make  no  effort  to  improve,  persecuting  Christians 
who  spend  their  time  in  denouncing  heretics,  and  saying, 
"  My  Lord  delayeth  his  coming,"  never  understand  the  signs 
of  the  times,  nor  recognize  any  new  influx  of  divine  light  in 
the  world.  At  each  new  coming  of  Christ  those  who  have 
been  faithful  are  rewarded  by  more  light.  To  those  who 
have,  shall  be  given,  and  the  faithless  lose  what  they  had 
before.  From  him  who  hath  not,  shall  be  taken  away  even 
what  he  seems  to  have.     The  capacity  of  seeing  Christ  when 


SECOND    COMING    OF   CHRIST   AS   JUDGE.  337 

he  comes,  of  recognizing  him  in  any  new  manifestation  of 
truth,  depends  on  his  previous  fidelity. 

§  7.  Bdation  of  the  Account  of  the  Judgment  by  the  Mes- 
siah, in  Matt.  ch.  25,  to  his  Coming.  —  But  what  is  meant  by 
the  judgment  described  in  the  25th  chapter  of  Matthew,  com- 
mencing, "  "When  the  Son  of  man  shall  come  in  his  glory, 
and  all  the  angels  with  him,  then  shall  he  sit  upon  the  throne 
of  his  glory,  and  before  him  shall  be  gathered  all  nations, 
and  he  shall  separate  them  one  from  another,  as  a  shepherd 
divideth  the  sheep  from  the  goats."  This  stands  in  such 
close  connection  with  what  goes  before,  that  many  refer  this 
also  to  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem.  But  the  moral  mean- 
ing is  so  prominent,  that  others  apply  it  entii'ely  to  the  final 
judgment  in  the  future  life.  The  difficulties  on  both  sides 
disappear  if  we  reflect  that  the  principles  which  govern  this 
life  and  the  next  are  identical  —  that  Avhether  Christ  came 
at  Jerusalem,  comes  to-day,  or  comes  in  the  future  life,  the 
laws  of  Christian  retribution  are  the  same.  Wherever 
Christ  judges  men,  the  sheep  go  to  the  right,  and  the  goats 
to  the  left.  The  generous,  humane,  and  disinterested  hear 
always  the  words,  "  Come,  ye  blessed  of  my  Father  ;  inherit 
the  kingdom  prepared  for  you  from  the  foundation  of  the 
world."  The  judgment  in  this  world,  it  may  be,  is  only 
heard  in  the  depths  of  the  soul.  It  may  be  that  no  other 
mortal  knows  of  it.  Still  it  is  the  voice  of  Christ  which 
speaks.  Still  it  is  the  real  kingdom  which  they  inherit. 
The  judgment  in  the  future  life,  may  be  or  may  not  be, 
before  assembled  multitudes  whom  no  man  can  number,  and 
the  kingdom  then  inherited  may  be  one  shared  with  the 
angels,  and  extending  over  worlds.  Still  the  sentence  is  the 
same  in  both  cases.  The  judgment  of  Christ  is  one  in  all 
worlds.  It  was,  and  is,  and  shall  be.  Jesus  Christ  is  the 
same  yesterday,  to-day,  and  forever. 

It  may  be  said,  this  is  to  make  the  coming  of  Christ  mere- 
ly figurative  —  the  coming  of  ideas  and  principles  only  ;  only 
29 


338     ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

the  coming  of  his  religion  ;  and  this  is  but  an  invisible  ab- 
straction. We  reply,  that  according  to  our  view,  Christiani- 
ty cannot  be  conceived  of  as  an  abstraction,  apart  from  the 
person  of  Jesus,  nor  can  his  religion  come  imless  he  comes 
with  it.  Jesus  is  with  us  always,  in  the  world  always,  and 
none  the  less  really,  because  invisibly.  It  is  no  figure  of 
speech  to  say  that  Christ  is  with  his  Church,  and  with  his 
truth  ;  that  where  it  goes,  he  goes  ;  that  when  he  comes,  it 
comes.  It  may  even  be  that  his  presence  will  not  always 
be  an  invisible  one.  It  may  be  that  what  we  now  believe, 
we  shall  one  day  see  and  know.  But  then  those  only  will 
recognize  their  Master's  presence  who  are  awake  and  watch- 
ing for  him.  To  the  others  it  will  seem  a  mere  illusion  or 
enthusiasm. 

§  8.  now  Christ  is,  and  how  he  is  not,  to  jtidge  the  World.  — 
In  some  places  Jesus  says  that  he  is  made  Judge  of  mankind, 
and  in  other  places  denies  that  he  is  to  judge  any  one.  Take, 
for  example,  the  following  passages,  selected  because  they 
seem  to  contradict  each  other.  They  are  all  in  the  Gospel  of 
John,  and  therefore  the  contradiction  is  not  in  the  diff'ei'ent 
limitations  or  special  misconceptions  of  the  difterent  evan- 
gelists. The  passages  are,  John  3:17;  9:39;  5:22;  8: 
15;  12:47.  The  first  is  as  follows  :  "  For  God  sent  not  his 
Son  into  the  world  to  condemn  the  world,  but  that  the  world 
through  him  might  be  saved."  The  word  here  translated 
"  condemn "  is  precisely  the  same  as  that  which  elsewhere 
is  translated  '■'■judge."  Consequently  we  should  here  read 
that  God  sent  Christ  into  the  world,  not  to  judge  the  world, 
but  to  save  it.  But  the  next  text  referred  to  (John  9  :  39) 
is  one  in  which  Jesus  says,  "  For  judgment  have  I  come 
into  the  world,  that  they  which  see  not  may  see,  and  that 
they  which  see  might  be  made  blind."  Again  (in  John 
5  :  22)  it  is  said,  that  "  the  Father  judgeth  no  man,  but  halli 
committed  all  judgment  unto  the  Son."  But  in  the  follow- 
ing passage  (John  8:15)  Jesus  says,  "  Ye  judge  after  the 


SECOND    COMING    OF    CHRIST    AS   JUDGE,  339 

flesh.  I  judge  no  man."  And  in  the  last  text  he  repeats 
the  same  idea.  "  And  if  any  man  hear  my  words  and  be- 
lieve not,  I  judge  him  not  ;  for  I  came  not  to  judge  the  world, 
but  to  save  the  world."  We  have,  therefore,  in  these  pas- 
sages, this  apparent  contradiction  —  that  the  Saviour  seems  in 
some  places  to  declare  that  he  is  to  judge  the  world,  and  in 
otiiers  that  he  is  not  to  judge  the  world.  We  therefore  shall 
do  well  to  inquire  how  these  are  to  be  understood,  and  in 
what  way  at  all  they  arc  to  be  reconciled  with  each  other, 
and  with  the  common  Orthodox  doctrine  concerning  judg- 
ment. 

And  here  we  may  remark,  in  passing,  that  there  are  many 
such  seeming  contradictions  as  these  in  the  New  Testament, 
and  that  to  the  student  of  the  Gospels,  Avho  is  a  sincere  seeker 
of  truth,  they  are  very  precious  and  valuable.  Such  a  one  is 
always  glad  iat  finding  statements  in  the  New  Testament  which 
thus  appear  opposed  to  each  other ;  for  he  knows,  by  experi- 
ence, that  they  are  the  very  passages  from  which  he  may  learn 
the  most,  and  where  he  will  be  likely  to  find  some  hitherto 
unnoticed  truth  concerning  Christ  or  his  gospel.  Such  truth, 
however,  will  not  be  found  if  he  attempts  to  remove  the  con- 
tradiction by  any  artificial,  hasty,  or  forced  process.  If  his 
object  is  merely  to  find  proof-texts  in  snpport  of  the  doctrines 
he  already  believes,  such  paradoxes  will  afford  him- nothing 
but  barren  difficulties,  and  a  sphere  for  the  exercise  of  sophis- 
try and  misplaced  ingenuity.  But  if  he  can  bear  to  admit 
his  ignorance,  and  is  willing  to  examine  these  difficulties  in 
order  to  correct  his  own  errors,  enlarge  his  own  views,  and 
learn  something  really  new,  he  will  often  find  here  the  clew 
to  deeper  insight  and  to  a  larger  knowledge. 

What,  then,  is  the  explanation  of  these  passages?  In 
what  way  is  Christ  to  judge  ?  How  is  it  that  he  has  come 
into  this  world  for  judgment  f  and  how  has  the  Father  com- 
mitted all  judgment  unto  the  Son?  and  how,  nevertheless,  can 
he  say,  "  I  judge  no  man  ;  for  /  catiie  not  to  judge  the  world  "  f 


340     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

Christ's  coming  was  simply  to  do  good  ;  to  make  men  bet- 
ter ;  to  stive  them  from  their  sins  ;  to  reveal  pardon  ;  to  ofier 
salvation  ;  to  manifest  God's  love.  "  The  law  was  given  by 
Moses,  but  grace  and  truth  came  by  Jesus  Christ."  It  is 
the  law,  and  not  the  gospel,  which  judges  and  condemns  the 
evil-doer.  The  law  given  by  Moses,  or  the  law  given  in  the 
conscience,  in  the  reason,  in  the  nature  of  things,  written  on 
the  face  of  nature,  written  in  the  soul  of  man,  —  this  law  has 
not  been  made  more  strict  by  the  coming  of  Christ.  Men 
were  bound  before,  by  the  law  of  nature  and  the  law  of 
Moses,  to  love  God  with  all  their  heart,  and  their  neighbor 
as  themselves  ;  and  they  are  not  bound  to  do  more  now. 
They  Avere  bound  by  nature  and  reason  to  obey  their  con- 
science, to  do  the  best  they  could  always,  and  they  are  not 
bound  to  do  any  more  now.  The  whole  influence  of  the 
gospel  is  a  bountiful  and  gracious  one,  intended  and  adapted 
to  make  it  easier  to  do  right,  to  add  new  motives  to  virtue. 
Christ  is  no  strict,  severe  judge,  deciding  by  the  letter  of  the 
law,  bound  by  his  office  to  show  no  favor  or  compassion,  but 
the  sinner's  advocate  and  friend.  And  hence  it  may  truly 
be  said  that  he  came  not  to  judge  the  world,  but  to  save  the 
world. 

Nevertheless,  it  is  also  true  that  the  greatest  blessings  and 
the  best  gifts  of  God  are  also  judgments.  They  test  the 
character.  They  show  what  it  is.  According  to  the  state 
of  mind  and  heart  in  which  a  man  is,  so  does  he  receive,  or 
reject,  or  neglect  the  offered  good.  If  he  loves  light,  he 
comes  to  the  light.  If  he  loves  darkness,  he  goes  away. 
If  his  deeds  are  good,  he  gratefully  receives  any  revelation 
which  brings  him  nearer  to  God.  If  his  deeds  are  evil,  he 
rejects  such  revelation,  avoids  it,  dislikes  the  thought  of  it. 
So  it  necessarily  is  that  the  best  and  kindest  of  men  who 
wishes  only  to  do  good  to  all,  nevertheless,  by  his  very  pres- 
ence and  his  offers  of  good,  judges  and  condemns  the  wicked. 
But  what  are  the  judgment  and  the  sentence  ?    Simply  this  — 


SECOND   COMING   OF   CHRIST,   AS  JUDGE.  341 

that  light  has  come  iuto  the  world,  and  that  they  have  chosoo 
darkness  rather  than  light,  because  their  deeds  are  evil. 
Therefore  it  was  necessarily  the  case  that  the  coming  of 
Jesus  into  the  Avorld  was  a  judgment,  and  that  though  he 
everywhere  went  with  the  purpose  of  saving  and  blessing 
men,  yet  that  he  necessarily  was  also  a  judge.  The  thoughts 
of  many  hearts  were  revealed  by  his  presence.  The  pure  in 
heart  came  to  him  in  humility,  penitence,  and  faith.  The 
proud  in  heart,  the  self-willed,  the  self-righteous,  turned  away 
from  him,  and  so  judged  themselves  unworthy  of  receiving 
his  truth.  The  Galilean  peasants,  the  common  people,  heard 
him  gladly.  The  Scribes  and  Pharisees  murmured  against 
him  and  rejected  him.  This  was  really  a  judgment  on  both  : 
the  sheep  went  to  the  right  hand,  and  the  goats  to  the  left. 
Thus  it  is  a  law  of  human  nature  that  all  high  truth  by  its 
coming  judges  men,  and  shows  by  its  influence  upon  them 
what  is  their  real  state.  And  in  this  way,  as  Christ's  truth 
was  the  highest  of  all,  so  he  was,  and  is,  a  judge  in  the  high- 
est sense.  But  this  is  not  quite  all.  The  coming  of  such 
truth  not  only  shows  the  good  and  evil  Avhich  are  in  men,  but 
it  develops  them,  brings  them  out,  increases  the  good,  increases 
also  the  evil.  It  is  necessarily  so  ;  it  cannot  be  otherwise. 
When  good  comes  to  us,  if  it  does  not  make  us  better,  it  makes 
us  worse.  Truth  and  goodness  are  like  the  magnet.  They 
have  two  poles.  They  attract  and  they  repel.  Thus  it  was 
written  that  the  coming  of  Jesus  would  be  for  the  fall  or 
the  rising  of  many.  Thus  he  said,  "  For  judgment  I  have 
come  into  the  world,  that  those  which  see  not  may  see,  and  that 
those  who  see  may  be  made  blind."  Peter  was  made  better, 
Judas  was  made  worse,  by  being  in  the  company  of  Christ. 
His  coming  was  not  only  judgment,  but  also  reward  and  pun- 
ishment. He  came  to  the  fishermen  of  Galilee :  they  wero 
pure  in  heart,  they  were  lovers  of  truth  and  goodness,  and 
his  coming  transformed  them  into  apostles,  saints,  and  mar- 
tyrs. He  came  to  the  Scribes  and  Pharisees :  they  were  not 
29* 


342     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

pure  in  heart.  They  were  proud  of  their  position,  their  in- 
fluence, their  piety,  and  his  coming  transformed  them  into 
murderers. 

We  are  now  prepared  to  decide  what  is  meant  by  Jesus  in 
saying  that  he  came  to  judge  the  world,  and  yet  that  he  came 
not  to  judge,  but  to  save.  It  was  not  the  purpose  of  his  mis- 
sion to  judge.  The  direct  object  of  his  coming  was  not  to 
judge,  but  to  save  ;  but  indirectly,  and  as  a  matter  of  neces- 
sity, one  of  the  consequences  of  his  coming  was,  that  men 
were  judged  by  the  word  which  he  spoke,  by  the  truth  which 
he  manifested,  by  the  holiness  of  his  life,  by  the  bliss  which 
he  offered,  and  which  they  rejected.  And  yet  it  was  true 
that  he  did  not  judge  them,  and  that  he  did  not  mean  to 
judge  them.  They  were  already  judged  by  their  own  choice 
and  determination.  Therefore  he  says,  "  He  who  believeth 
not  on  me  is  judged  already,  because  he  hath  not  believed 
on  the  name  of  the  only  begotten  Sou  of  God."  It  was  not 
the  will  of  Christ,  but  the  truth  itself,  which  pronounced  the 
sentence  upon  him.  "  The  word  that  I  have  spoken,  the  same 
shall  judge  him  at  the  last  day."  And  thus  it  is  said,  that 
God  is  the  Judge  of  all,  and  yet  again,  that  the  Father  judg- 
eth  no  man,  but  hath  committed  all  judgment  unto  the  Son, 
and  hath  given  him  authority  to  execute  judgment  also,  be- 
cause he  is  the  Son  of  man.  The  explanation  is,  that  men 
are  judged  by  the  truth.  But  this  truth  is  not  abstract,  but 
the  truth  embodied  in  the  life  and  teaching  of  Jesus.  God 
does  not  come  into  the  world  himself  to  show  men  their  sins, 
but  he  embodies  his  truth  and  holiness  in  the  life  of  his  Son, 
and  so  judges  the  world. 

In  giving  this  explanation,  we  have  looked  steadily  at  the 
essential  thing  in  judgment.  We  have  regarded  the  sub- 
stance, not  the  form.  If  we  think  of  judgment  as  something 
outward,  the  judge  seated  on  his  throne,  the  criminal  stand- 
ing before  him,  and  a  formal  sentence  pronounced,  of  acquit- 
tal  or  condemnation,    we   confess   that  we   should   find   it 


SECOND  COMING  OF  CHRIST,  AS  JUDGE.     343 

difficult  to  reconcile  these  difterent  passages  of  Scripture, 
some  of  which  declare  that  Clirist  is  to  be  the  judge,  and 
others  that  he  is  not  to  be.  But  wluit  is  the  essential  thing 
in  judgment?  It  is  that  justice  shall  be  done,  and  that  truth 
and  right  shall  be  vindicated ;  that  the  good  shall  be  re- 
warded, and  the  wicked  pimished  ;  that  virtue  and  truth  shall 
be  seen  and  recognized  in  the  consciences  of  men  for  what  they 
are.  This  is  the  essential  thing.  How  this  is  done,  whether 
in  an  open  tribunal,  before  the  assembled  universe,  or  in  the 
secret  places  of  every  man's  soul,  belongs  not  to  the  essence, 
but  to  the  form,  and  is  comparatively  unimportant. 

§  9.  When  Christ's  Judgment  takes  Place.  —  Nevertheless, 
there  is  a  more  important  question  to  be  answered  in  relation 
to  the  time  of  judgment.  When  is  the  judgment?  For  it 
may  be  thought,  from  what  we  have  said,  that  we  consider 
judgment  as  taking  place  only  in  this  world.  But  such  is 
not  the  fact.  Christ's  judgments  take  place  at  Christ's  com- 
ing, whether  here  or  hereafter.  Whenever  Christ  comes,  he 
comes  to  judge.  His  first  coming,  in  Judea,  was  a  judg- 
ment ;  and  he  said,  "  Noiv  is  the  judgment  of  the  world." 
His  coming  judged  all  those  who  were  near  him ;  revealed 
the  state  of  their  minds  and  hearts  ;  showed  them  what  they 
were.  Wherever  he  went,  men  arranged  themselves  at  once 
according  to  their  real  characters,  and  the  thoughts  of  many 
hearts  were  revealed. 

It  is  true  that  people  at  that  day  did  not  understand  that 
they  were  thus  condemning  themselves.  They  did  not  know 
that  the  awful  judgment  of  God  was  being  pronounced  upon 
them  ;  that  they  were  standing  before  his  bar  in  the  presence 
of  angels.  They  did  not  know  that  the  day  of  judgment  had 
come,  and  that  they  were  giving  an  account  of  every  idle 
word  even  then.  But  so  it  was.  When  they  scoffed  at  Jesus 
and  said,  ''  He  is  a  gluttonous  man  and  a  wine-bibber,"  they 
may  have  foi-gotten  their  words  almost  before  they  left  their 
mouths.     But    there    they   stand,   recorded    against    them 


344    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

forever  —  an  everlasting  proof  of  their  blindness  of  mind  and 
their  hardness  of  heart.  When  the  penitent  woman  brought 
the  ointment  and  anointed  the  feet  of  Jesus,  and  bathed  them 
with  her  tears,  little  did  she  think  that  it  was  her  day  of 
judgment  also,  and  that  the  approving  sentence  of  her  act 
would  be  read  by  angels  in  heaven  and  countless  myriads 
on  earth.  None  of  them  knew  that  it  was  a  judgment  then  ; 
but  it  was  so. 

But  was  that  the  only  judgment?  No;  for  whenever 
Jesus  comes,  he  comes  to  judge  ;  and  since  that,  his  first 
coming,  he  has  come  again  and  again  to  individuals  and  to  the 
world,  and  every  coming  has  been  a  new  judgment  on  the 
state  of  the  human  mind  and  heart.  It  has  therefore  been 
well  said,  that  the  history  of  the  world  is  the  judgment  of  the 
world.  And  it  is  always  true  that  this  judgment  is  not  un- 
derstood when  it  is  pronounced,  but  is  seen  and  recognized 
afterwards.  It  is  so  with  individuals  ;  it  is  so  with  commu- 
nities. Who  is  there  who,  in  looking  back  over  his  past  life, 
does  not  witness  many  an  hour  in  which  the  truth  has  come 
to  him,  and  he  refused  to  admit  it,  and  so  sentenced  himself 
to  receive  a  lie  ?  in  which  he  has  had  opportunities  of  im- 
provement, opportunities  of  doing  good,  and  has  refused  to 
accept  them,  and  so  the  talent  has  been  taken  from  him  and 
given  to  another.  This  is  the  judgment  —  that  light  has 
come  into  the  world,  and  we  have  chosen  darkness.  At  the 
time  we  did  not  know  it :  blinded  by  prejudice,  heated  by 
passion,  we  rushed  recklessly  on.  But  sooner  or  later  comes 
the  calm  hour  of  recollection,  and  we  see  ourselves  as  we  are. 

But  is  this  judgment  which  takes  place  in  this  world  the 
only  one?  It  is  unreasenable  to  think  so.  There  are,  in 
fact,  two  extreme  views  on  this  subject.  The  views  of  those 
who  say  that  all  judgment  is  in  this  life,  and  the  views  of 
those  who  say  that  no  judgment  is  in  this  life.  The  New 
Testament  teaches  that  we  are  judged  here,  and  that  we  are 
also  judged  hereafter.     The  coming  of  Christ  is  here,  and 


SECOND   COMING    OP   CHRIST,    AS   JUDGE.  345 

also  hereafter  ;  and  the  judgment  which  commenced  with  his 
first  coming  will  not  be  completed  till  all  of  us  stand  before 
the  judgment  seat  to  give  an  account  of  the  deeds  done  in 
the  body,  whether  they  be  good  or  evil.  ''  It  is  appointed 
unto  men  once  to  die,  but  after  this  the  judgment."  There 
is  a  judgment  in  this  life,  and  another  to  come.  But  those 
will  be  best  prepared  for  that  future  judgment  who  under- 
stand the  present  judgment.  Here  is  an  example  of  the 
nature  of  the  judgments  which  take  place  in  this  world. 

In  the  year  1633,  an  old  man  was  brought  before  the 
Court  of  the  Inquisition,  consisting  of  seven  cardinals  of  the 
Roman  Catholic  Church,  to  hear  a  sentence  and  to  pronounce 
a  recantation.  The  crime  he  had  committed  was  the  publi- 
cation of  a  book  in  the  form  of  a  dialogue,  maintaining  that 
the  sun  stood  still,  and  that  the  earth  moved ;  which  propo- 
sition these  holy  cardinals  pronounced  to  be  absurd,  false  in 
philosophy,  and  formally  heretical,  seeing  that  it  was  ex- 
pressly contrary  to  Holy  Scripture.  Whereupon  they  call 
upon  him  to  abjure,  execrate,  and  detest  these  errors  aud 
heresies ;  prohibiting  his  book  and  condemning  him  to  con- 
finement, with  the  penance  of  reciting  once  a  week,  for  three 
years,  the  seven  penitential  psalms.  And  thereupon  this 
man,  Galileo  Galilei,  of  the  age  of  seventy,  on  his  knees, 
with  his  hands  on  the  Gospels,  abjures  his  opinion. 

These  seven  cardinals  thought  that  they  were  pronouncing 
sentence  on  Galileo  and  on  the  Copernican  system.  But,  in 
reality,  they  pronounced  sentence  on  themselves  and  their 
own  church.  They  put  it  upon  record  forever,  that  the  Ro- 
man Catholic  Church,  claiming  to  be  infallible  in  matters  of 
faith,  had,  by  its  highest  judicature,  declared  the  Copernican 
system  a  heresy,  and  thus  declared  its  own  claim  to  infalli- 
bility a  lie.  This  was  the  condemnation  —  that  light  had 
come  into  the  world,  and  they  chose  darkness  rather  than 
light. 

So  it  is  whenever  a  new  truth  comes  into  the  world  :  it 


846    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

attracts  the  free-minded,  the  lovers  of  truth ;  ^it  repels  those 
bound  by  interest  or  passion.  Those  who  believe,  with  Solo- 
mon, that  a  living  dog  is  better  than  a  dead  lion,  leave  be- 
hind them  the  past,  and  with  open  eyes  go  forward,  leaving 
the  dead  to  bury  the  dead.  Those  who  change  the  maxim, 
and  love  a  dead  dog  more  than  a  living  lion,  turn  their  backs 
to  the  east  and  to  the  rising  sun,  and  hug  their  much-loved 
errors  to  their  hearts.  So  the  truth  stands  in  their  midst, 
awful  in  its  beauty,  and  judges  them  —  sending  away  its  foes, 
drawing  its  friends  to  its  embrace. 

But  it  is  not  in  abstract  truth,  whether  of  science  or  theol- 
ogy, that  Christ  comes  to  us  now.  It  is  in  the  truth  in  its 
concrete  shape,  embodied  in  the  reforms  which  overthrow 
evil,  in  the  great  moral  improvements  which  do  away  with 
the  sin  and  woe  of  the  world.  Every  new  cause  of  this  sort 
parts  the  sheep  from  the  goats,  and  causes  the  thoughts  of 
many  hearts  to  be  revealed.  We  do  not  mean  to  assert  that 
all  who  sympathize  with  any  particular  reformatory  measures, 
or  any  particular  reformatory  party,  are  on  the  side  of  Christ, 
and  all  who  disapprove  these  measures,  or  this  party,  are 
against  him.  Such  an  assertion  would  be  the  sign  of  the 
narrowest  bigotry  or  the  most  foolish  ignorance  of  human 
nature.  But  we  mean  to  say,  that  when  any  great  human 
and  moral  movement  comes  to  rouse  men's  minds  to  a  great 
evil  —  such  as  the  evil  of  war,  slavery,  intemperance,  licen- 
tiousness, popular  ignorance,  pauperism,  infidelity,  it  is  impos- 
sible for  good  men  not  to  take  an  interest  in  it,  and  in  their 
own  way  to  aid  it.  If  men  neglect  and  ridicule  such  move- 
ments, find  fault  with  all  that  is  done,  and  do  nothing  them- 
selves, they  show  thereby  that  they  do  not  care  so  much  for 
their  brother's  happiness  as  for  their  own  ease  and  comfort. 
In  this  way  it  becomes  true  that 

"  Some  great  cause,  God's  new  Messiah,  offering  each  the  bloom  or  blight, 
Parts  the  goats  upon  the  left  hand,  parts  the  sheep  upon  the  right, 
And  the  choice  goes  by  forever  'twixt  that  darkness  and  the  light." 


SECOND   COMING   OF   CUUIST,    AS   JUDGE.  347 

We  read  in  the  book  of  Acts,  that  after  Paul  and  Barnabas 
had  preaclied  the  gospel  to  the  Jews  in  Antioch,  the  Gca- 
tiles  were  interested  also,  and  great  multitudes  came  together 
to  hear  the  word  of  God.  But  when  the  Jews  saw  the  mul- 
titudes, they  were  filled  with  cuvy,  and  contradicted  Paul 
and  blasphemed.  Then  Paul  and  Barnabas  waxed  bold, 
and  said,  ''  It  was  necessary  that  the  word  of  God  ahould  be 
first  preached  to  you ;  but  since  you  put  it  from  you,  and 
judge  yourselves  tiniuorthy  of  eternal  life.,  lo,  we  turn  to  the 
Gentiles."  A  hard  judgment  for  a  man  to  pronounce  on 
himself —  that  he  is  not  worthy  of  eternal  life ! 

But  do  we  not  often  all  do  the  same  ?  Christ  comes  to  us 
in  the  form  of  a  new  truth,  which  will  correct  our  errors 
and  enlarge  our  hearts.  But  loving  our  own  little  creed  bet- 
ter than  the  truth,  we  reject  it  Avithout  examination,  and  so 
judge  ourselves  unworthy  of  the  light,  strength,  and  peace  it 
might  bestow.  Christ  comes  again  in  some  opportunity  of 
usefulness  to  our  neighbor.  But  loving  our  own  selfish  ease, 
we  excuse  ourselves,  and  so  judge  ourselves  unworthy  of  the 
happiness  we  should  enjoy  in  doing  the  kind  action.  He 
comes  in  some  deep  conviction,  calling  us  to  a  new  life.  We 
feel  that  we  ought  to  leave  our  frivolity,  and  live  for  God 
and  eternity  —  live  for  what  is  real  and  permanent.  But  we 
stifle  these  convictions,  and  go  back  to  our  old  lives,  and  so 
judge  that  we  are  not  worthy  to  become  the  friends  and  fel- 
low-workers of  Jesus,  and  companions  of  the  pure  and  good. 
The  great  feast  is  ready,  and  the  invitation  is  sent  to  us,  and 
we,  with  one  consent,  begin  to  make  excuse.  Do  we  think 
that  in  that  moment  we  are  standing  before  the  judgment 
seat  of  God,  and  pronouncing  sentence  on  ourselves  ?  It  is 
our  own  heart  that  condemns  us,  and  God,  and  Christ,  and 
the  everlasting  truth  of  things  must  confirm  the  sentence. 

§  10.  Paul's  View  of  the  Judgment  by  Christ.  —  What 
were  the  views  of  the  apostle  Paul  concerning  a  future  judg- 
ment?    One  of  the  passages  is  in  Romans.     (2  :  5-16.)     In 


S'iS  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

this  passage  Paul  describes  a  day,  or  time,  when  God  should 
judge  and  bring  to  light  the  secrets  of  the  human  heart. 
He  refers  probably  to  the  coming  of  Christ,  as  described  iu 
the  twenty-fifth  chapter  of  Matthew.  Christ's  coming  is 
represented  as  "  that  day"  the  "  day  of  judgment,"  as,  "  it 
shall  be  more  tolerable  for  Sodom  and  Gomorrah  in  the  day 
of  judgment."  It  was  not,  we  have  seen,  as  is  commonly 
supposed,  only  a  judgment  in  the  other  world  after  death, 
but  also  a  judgment  in  this  world.  It  was  not  when  we 
should  go  to  Christ  in  the  other  world,  but  when  Christ 
should  come  to  us  in  this  world.  It  is  spoken  of  as  a  par- 
ticular day,  or  time,  and,  no  doubt,  it  was  thought  at  first 
by  Paul,  as  by  the  other  apostles,  that  the  coming  of  Christ 
was  to  be  sudden  and  outward  —  an  imposing  visible  transac- 
tion. But,  gradually,  Paul's  views  on  this  subject  changed, 
under  the  influence  of  a  growing  spiritual  insight.  At  first 
he  interprets  literally  what  Jesus  says  of  his  coming.  But 
afterwards,  in  his  later  Epistles  to  the  Ephesians  and  Colos- 
sians,  he  ceases  to  dwell  on  the  outward  coming,  and  speaks 
of  the  inward  revelation  of  Christ  in  the  heart  —  speaks  of 
our  now  sitting  in  heavenly  places  with  Christ.  "We  may, 
therefore,  suppose  that  the  apostle  believed  the  essence  of  the 
judgment  to  be  in  this  —  that  either  in  this  woi-ld  or  the  next, 
or  both,  there  shall  be  a  revelation  of  God's  truth  to  the  soul, 
so  that  every  soul  shall  see  itself  as  God  sees  it  —  see  its  own 
evil  or  good,  and  so  be  rewarded  or  punished  by  that  sight. 
This  idea  is  given  by  Jesus  himself,  in  his  description  of  the 
judgment  which  was  to  take  place  before  that  generation 
passed  away  —  a  judgment  in  which  the  Son  of  man  should 
be  seated  on  the  throne  of  his  glory,  with  all  his  angels,  and 
all  nations  be  collected  before  him.  The  judgment  consists 
in  showing  to  the  good,  that  when  they  did  anything  good  to 
man,  they  did  it  to  Christ  and  God ;  and  iu  showing  to  the 
bad,  that  when  they  refused  anything  to  their  poor  brethren 
in  want,  they  refused  it  to  Christ  and  God.     The  judgment 


SECOND   COMING    OF   CHRIST,    AS   JUDGE.  349 

is  therefore  making  known  to  each  man  his  own  real  char- 
acter. Tlie  consequence  of  that  revelation  is,  that  some 
men  immediately  go  into  spiritual  happiness,  and  others  into 
spiritual  suffering. 

This  is  the  substance  of  the  Christian  doctrine  of  judgment, 
as  taught  in  the  New  Testament.  All  else  is  accessory,  and 
belongs  to  the  rhetoric  —  is  part  of  the  raise  en  scene  ;  but  there 
are  two  points  in  the  views  of  the  apostle  concerning  judg- 
ment, which  deserve  further  notice.  The  first  is  in  1  Cor. 
6  :  2,  where  he  says,  "  Know  ye  not  that  the  saints  shall 
judge  the  world?"  and  (verse  3),  "  Know  ye  not  that  we 
shall  judge  angels?"  He  speaks  of  this  as  of  something 
which  they  already  knew,  or  at  any  rate  could  know ;  some- 
thing like  an  axiom,  as  when  he  says  (verse  9),  "  Know  ye 
not  that  the  unrighteous  shall  not  inherit  the  kingdom  of 
God?"  or  (verse  19),  "Know  ye  not  that  your  body  is  the 
temple  of  the  Holy  Spirit?"  This  notion  is  based  on  the 
idea  of  the  unity  of  Christ  and  his  disciples.  Christians  are 
joint  heirs  with  Christ.  Whatever  Christ  inherits,  they  re- 
ceive and  share  with  him.  If  he  judges  the  world,  and 
judges  angels,  they  do  the  same  with  him,  because  they 
share  his  spirit  of  insight.  Paul  thinks  the  essence  of  Chris- 
tianity to  be  so  profound,  that  even  the  angels,  desiring  to 
look  into  it,  may  not  have  seen  it.  Therefore  Christians,  to 
whose  heart  God  has  revealed  it  by  his  Spirit,  may  be  able 
to  set  the  angels  right  in  some  matters.  But  this  does  away 
with  the  notion  of  a  literal  day  of  judgment ;  for  we  can 
hardly  imagine  Christians  to  be  assembled  together  and 
seated  on  a  throne  by  the  side  of  Christ,  in  order  to  judge 
the  world.  Some  millions  of  Christians  seated  on  a  local 
throne  as  judges,  with  millions  of  men  and  angels  standing 
before  them,  is  an  impossible  picture. 

The  other  point  is  the  passage  in  1  Cor.  11:31:  "  If  we 
would  judge  ourselves,  we  should  not  be  judged."  Here  a 
principle  seems  to  be  laid  down  —  that  just  so  far  as  we  apply 
30 


350         orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors, 

God's  truth  to  our  own  hearts  and  consciences,  we  do  not 
need  tb  have  it  applied  by  God.  And  this  corresponds  with 
the  account  of  the  judgment  to  which  we  have  before  referred, 
in  the  twenty-fifth  chapter  of  Matthew.  Those  who  are 
there  called  up  for  judgment,  and  who  stand  before  the 
throne,  are  not  Jews  or  Christians,  but  Gentiles  (li  eOfrf),, 
The  holy  angels  are  with  Christ  in  his  glory.  The  heathen 
appear  before  him  ;  those  who  have  been  doing  good  without 
knowing  it  are  received  by  him  into  his  kingdom,  as  those 
who  have  been  blessed  by  his  Father.  They  are  Christians, 
it  appears,  without  knowing  it.  They  inherit  the  kingdom, 
from  which  the  original  heirs  who  have  been  wicked  and 
slothful  servants,  and  who  have  buried  their  talent  in  the 
napkin,  are  excluded.  Christians  who  have  judged  them- 
selves, and  applied  Christianity  by  their  own  lives,  are  not 
to  be  judged  at  the  coming  of  Christ,  but  only  those  who 
have  been  doing  right  or  wrong  ignorantly.* 

§  11.  Final  Result.  —  The  course  of  our  investigations  in 
the  present  chapter  has  brought  us  to  this  result.  Ortho- 
doxy is  right  in  expecting  the  coming  of  Christ  in  this  world, 
but  wrong  in  supposing  it  wholly  future  and  wholly  outward. 


*  The  difficulties  (of  which  Olshausen  and  other  candid  Orthodox  interpreters 
speak)  in  harmonizing  the  different  parts  of  Matthew's  two  chapters  (24  and  25) 
about  Christ's  coming  and  judgment,  may  perhaps  be  relieved  in  some  such 
way  as  this.  (1.)  The  end  of  the  Mosaic  age  and  the  beginning  of  the  Mes 
sianicage  are  fixed  at  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem.  (2.)  Christ's  coming  begins 
there,  and  continues  through  Christian  history,  till  all  mankind  are  Christians. 
His  coming,  therefore,  verifies  what  Schiller  says  of  truth,  that  it  "  nimmer 
ist,  immer  wird."  (3.)  Whenever  he  comes,  he  judges  men  according  to  the 
state  of  mind  in  which  they  are.  (4.)  The  three  parables  (virgins,  talents, 
king  on  his  throne)  represent  the  judgment  on  three  different  classes.  The 
first  class  (of  wise  and  foolish  virghis)  are  those  who  are  not  yet  converted,  and 
have  not  become  disciples  of  Christ.  When  he  comes,  those  of  them  who  have 
oil  in  their  lamps  —  or  who  receive  truth  into  an  honest  heart  (Luke  8  :  15)  —  are 
ready  to  receive  him,  and  to  become  Christians ;  those  who  have  no  oil  reject 
him.  The  second  class  (in  the  talents)  are  Christians,  who  receive  more  or 
less  of  power  and  of  good,  according  to  past. fidelity.  The  third  class  (the 
"  nations  ")  are  the  heathen,  and  others,  who  have  never  known  of  Christ  at  all, 
but  are  Christians  outside  of  Christianity. 


SECOND    COMING   OF   CHRIST,    AS   JUDGE.  351 

It  is  right  in  makiug  it  a  personal  coming,  and  not  merely 
the  coming  of  his  truth  apart  from  him,  but  wrong  in  con- 
ceiving of  this  personal  coming,  as  material  to  the  senses, 
instead  of  spiritual  to  the  soul.  It  is  right  in  expecting  a 
judgment,  but  wrong  in  placing  it  only  in  the  other  world. 
It  is  right  in  supposing  that  all  mankind,  the  converted,  the 
unconverted,  and  the  heathen,  are  to  be  judged  by  Christian 
truth,  but  wrong  in  supposing  that  this  judgment  must  occur 
in  one  place  or  at  one  time.  Finally,  in  this,  as  in  regard 
to  many  other  doctrines.  Orthodoxy  fails  by  neglecting  the 
great  saying  of  Jesus,  "  The  spirit  quickeneth,  the  flesh 
PROFiTETH  NOTHING,"  and  the  similar  statement  of  Paul, 
"  The  letteb  killeth." 


352         orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 


CHAPTER    XIV.  ; 

ETERNAL   PUNISHMENT,   ANNIHILATION,   UNIVERSAL    EESTO-        l 

ration.  I 

§  1.  —  Different  Views  concerning  the  Condition  of  the  IrU' 
penitent  hereafter. —  The  different  views  concerning  the  future 
state,  held  by  the  Christian  Church,  may  be  thus  classified ; 
arranging  them,  exhaustively,  under  eight  divisions  :  — 

I.  The  Roman  Catholic  Church  makes  three  conditions 
hereafter ;  viz.,  — 

1.  Everlasting  joy. 

2.  Everlasting  suffering. 

3.  Temporal  sorrow  in  purgatory. 

II.  The  Orthodox  Protestant  Church  makes  two  condi- 
tions hereafter ;  viz.,  — 

1.  Unmixed  and  everlasting  joy. 

2.  Unmixed  and  everlasting  suffering. 

III.  The  Old  School  Universalists  make  one  condition 
hereafter ;  viz.,  — 

1.  Eternal  joy. 

rV".  New  School  Universalists  and  Restorationists  make 
two  conditions  hereafter  ;  viz., — 

1.  Eternal  joy. 

2.  Temporal  and  finite  suffering. 

V.  Unitarians  make  an  indefinite  number  of  conditions 
hereafter,  according  to  the  various  characters  and  moral 
states  of  men. 

VI.  The  Swedenborgians  make  an  indefinite  but  limited 
number  of  heavens  and  hells,  suited  to  the  varieties  of  char- 
acter, but  haviug-  a  supernatural  origin. 


FUTURE  PUNISHMENT.  353 

VII.  The  Spiritualists  make  the  other  world  like  this 
world,  with  no  essential  diflerences,  making  it  a  continua- 
tion of  the  natural  life. 

VIII.  The  Aunihilationists  believe  that  the  finally  impen- 
itent will  perish  wholly,  and  come  to  nothing. 

This  statement  includes  all,  or  nearly  all,  of  the  views  held 
in  the  Christian  Cliurch  concerning  the  condition  of  departed 
souls  in  tl  e  other  world.  We  do  not  pi'opose  to  examine 
them  all  at  the  present  time ;  but  we  shall  examine  at  some 
length  three  of  them. 

Eternal  punishment,  annihilation,  and  universal  restora- 
tion are  the  three  principal  views  taken  in  the  Church  of  the 
condition  hereafter  of  those  who  die  impenitent,  and  in  a 
state  of  hostility  to  God.  The  Avicked  may  hereafter  be  re- 
formed, may  be  annihilated,  or  may  be  kept  in  a  state  of 
permanent  punishment.  One  of  these  views  is  held  by  the 
Universalists  ;  another  by  Orthodoxy  ;  the  third  is  now  adopted 
by  those  who  are  dissatisfied  with  the  horrors  of  Orthodoxy, 
but  not  yet  ready  to  accept  the  Optimism  of  the  Universalist 
hope.  We  will  consider  these,  beginning  with  the  Orthodox 
doctrine  of  everlasting  punishment.  We  wish  we  could  say 
that  this  doctrine  "was  not  fully  and  decidedly  Orthodox. 
But  it  is  quite  as  much  so  as  the  Trinity,  the  deity  of  Christ, 
or  the  atonement.  No  one  is  allowed  to  have  any  doubts  or 
questions  concerning  it.  It  seems  to  be  believed  that  the 
whole  system  of  Orthodoxy  would  be  endangered,  if  this  ter- 
ror was  not  held  to  its  bosom  with  an  unfaltering  grasp. 

§  2.  The  Doctrine  of  Everlasting  Punishment,  as  held  hy 
the  Orthodox  at  the  Present  Time.  —  What  is  this  doctrine, 
as  it  is  taught  at  the  present  day  in  all  Orthodox  churches, 
and  as  it  stands  in  all  Orthodox  creeds?  It  is,  that  the 
moment  of  death  decides,  and  decides  forever,  the  destiny  of 
man  ;  that  those  who  die  impenitent,  unbelieving,  and  uncon- 
verted are  forever  lost,  Avithout  the  possibility  of  return ; 
that  those  thus  lost  are  to  suffer  forever  and  ever,  without 
30* 


354     ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

end,  the  most  grievous  torments  in  soul  and  body.  These 
torments  consist  in  banishment  from  the  presence  of  God, 
and  positive  sutFerings,  in  addition  thereto,  of  an  awful  kind. 
Precisely  what  they  are,  it  is  not,  perhaps,  necessary  for  an 
Orthodox  man  to  believe.  There  is  no  Orthodox  definition 
which  is  authoritative  on  that  point ;  and  considerable  range, 
therefore,  is  allowable.  The  suffering  may  be  that  of  literal 
fire,  or  it  may  not.  It  may  be  physical  suffering,  or  the 
pangs  of  conscience,  the  absence  of  love,  and  the  sense  of 
emptiness.  On  these  points  there  is  some  liberty  of  opinion, 
doubtless.  But  we  presume  that  it  would  not  be  Orthodox 
to  admit  a  preponderance,  in  hell,  of  good  over  evil ;  or  to 
admit,  with  Swedenborg,  the  existence  of  pleasure  there, 
even  though  it  be  only  a  diabolical  and  sinful  pleasure.  The 
doctrine  of  Orthodoxy  certainly  is,  that  evil  predominates 
over  good,  and  pain  over  pleasure,  in  the  condition  of  the 
damned ;  so  that  there  existence  is  a  curse,  and  not  a  bless- 
ing. Especially  is  hope  shut  out :  there  is  no  hope  of  re- 
turn, no  possibility  of  escape,  no  chaoce  of  repentance,  even 
at  the  end  of  myriads  of  years.  The  man  who  is  condemned 
to  imprisonment  for  life,  in  solitary  confinement,  is  in  an  un- 
fortunate condition  ;  but  he  has  hope,  —  hope  of  escape,  hope 
of  pardon,  —  sure  hope,  at  all  events,  of  deliverance,  one  day, 
by  death,  from  his  condition,  and  a  change  to  something  bet- 
ter, or  at  least  to  something  different.  But,  in  the  Orthodox 
opinion,  there  'is  no  such  alleviation  as  this  to  the  sufferings 
of  the  future  state. 

It  is  usual,  we  know,  for  many  Orthodox  preachers  to 
intensify  in  description  the  sufferings  of  the  future  state,  and 
to  task  their  imagination  for  multiplied  pictures  of  horror ; 
and  we  shall  presently  give  some  examples  to  show  how  far 
this  is  carried.  We  have  no  doubt  that  there  are  many  Or- 
thodox men  who  are  as  much  shocked  by  these  gross  descrip- 
tions as  those  are  who  deny  everlasting  punishment.  But 
are  they  not  themselves  really  responsible  for  them?     Those 


FUTURE   PUNISHMENT.  355 

■who  admit  the  principle  that  God  can  torment  his  children 
forever,  in  the  other  life,  for  sins  committed  in  this,  have 
accepted  the  principle,  from  which  any  view  of  the  Deity, 
however  shookinj:^,  may  very  legitimately  proceed. 

But  let  us,  for  the  present,  only  assume  that  Orthodoxy 
aiserts  a  preponderance  of  evil  over  good  in  the  other  world, 
and  that  this  preponderance  is  to  be  continued  without  end 
—  forever.     Let  us  see  what  this  means. 

It  means  that  the  suHering  to  be  endured  hereafter  by  each 
individual  soul,  as  a  punishment  for  sins  committed  in  this 
world,  will  infinitely  exceed  in  amount  all  the  suffering  borne 
on  the  surtace  of  the  earth,  by  its  total  population,  from  the 
creation  of  Adam  to  the  destruction  of  the  world.  Each  lost 
soul  will  suffer  not  only  more,  but  infinitely  more,  than  all 
the  accumulated  sufferings  of  the  human  race  throughout  all 
time.  We  shudder  as  we  read  the  account  of  the  sufferings 
from  hydrophobia,  or  the  burning  alive  of  a  slave  at  the 
South,  or  the  tortures  inflicted  by  the  Holy  Inquisition,  or 
the  horrors  of  a  field  of  battle,  or  the  cruelties  inflicted  by 
savages  upon  their  victims  ;  but  all  of  these,  added  together, 
are  finite,  and  the  sufferings  of  a  single  soul  hereafter  are 
infinite.  That  is  to  say,  all  the  pain  and  evil  of  this  world, 
resulting  from  all  human  sin,  thi-ough  all  time,  is  infinitely 
small  and  insignificant  when  compared  with  the  punishment 
endured  by  a  single  soul  hereafter  for  his  share  of  that  sin. 
And  all  this  is  inflicted  by  God ;  and  he  is  a  God  of  love. 

There  are  some  doctrines,  the  statement  of  which  is  their 
refutation.     This,  we  think,  is  one  of  them. 

But  it  must  also  be  considered,  that  this  doctrine,  which 
throws  such  darkness  over  the  future,  also  sends  down  a 
rayless  night  over  the  present.  It  refutes  every  theodicy  ;  it 
nullifies  every  solution  of  evil.  The  consolation  for  the  suf- 
ferings of  this  world  is,  that  the  fashion  of  this  world  passes 
away,  and  that  there  is  a  better  world  to  come.  The  ex- 
planation of  the  evils  of  this  life  is,  that  they  are  finite,  and 


356     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

that  they  are,  therefore,  to  be  swallowed  up  and  to  disappear 
in  an  infinite  good.  The  Christian  finds  relief,  in  consider- 
ing the  sufferings  of  this  world,  by  regarding  them  as  the 
means  of  a  greater  ultimate  joy  ;  by  looking  forward  to  the 
time  when  all  tears  shall  be  wiped  away ;  and  by  a  firm 
faith  that  love  is  stronger  than  selfishness,  good  stronger  than 
evil.  But  the  doctrine  of  eternal  punishment  gives  us,  in  the 
condition  of  a  single  lost  soul,  a  greater  amount  of  evil  here- 
after than  all  the  evil,  which  is  to  be  thus  explained,  here  ; 
and  the  myriads  of  lost  souls,  each  of  which  is  to  suffer  in- 
finitely more  than  all  the  suiFerings  of  the  present  world, 
present  us  with  a  problem,  in  the  future,  so  appalling,  that  the 
problem  of  present  evil,  vast  as  it  is,  becomes  insignificant 
by  its  side. 

We  are  tormented  with  evil  here.  We  seek  a  solution  of 
the  problem :  we  find  it  in  the  limited,  finite,  and  ancillary 
nature  of  evil.  But  that  solution  is  wholly  taken  away  when 
we  are  told  that  evil  is  infinite  and  eternal.  " 

It  seems  to  us  impossible  to  hold  the  common  doctrine  on 
this  subject,  without  having  the  gospel  view  of  the  divine 
character  essentially  shaken  ;  it  is  not  possible  to  regard  Him 
as  a  being  in  whom  love  is  the  essential  attribute.  If  this  is 
so,  as  we  shall  presently  undertake  to  prove,  it  becomes  a 
matter  of  vital,  importance  that  the  doctrine  should  be  dis- 
proved and  rejected.  It  is  not  enough  that  it  should  be 
quietly  laid  aside :  it  is  due  to  the  truth  that  it  should  be 
distinctly  and  fully  confuted.  For  this  doctrine,  if  it  be  false, 
is  deeply  dishonorable  to  God :  it  takes  away  his  highest 
glory ;  it  substitutes  fear  of  him,  in  the  place  of  love,  in  the 
human  heart ;  it  neutralizes  the  peculiar  power  of  the  gospel ; 
it  degrades  the  quality  of  Christian  piety,  and  poisons  religion 
in  its  fountain. 

The  Orthodox  doctrine  of  future  punishment  is,  then,  ex- 
ceedingly simple.  There  is  to  be  a  judgment  in  the  last  day, 
imiversal  and  final.     All  mankind  are  to  be  collected  before 


FUTURE  PUNISHMENT.  357 

the  judgment  seat  of  Christ,  and  there  to  be  divided  into  two 
classes,  —  one  on  the  right  hand,  and  the  other  on  the  left. 
These  are  to  go  upward,  to  heaven,  to  be  eternally  happy ; 
tliose  downward,  to  hell,  to  be  eternally  miserable.  There 
are  no  degrees  of  sutfering ;  for  the  torments  of  hell  are  in- 
finite in  degree,  as  well  as  everlasting  in  duration.  Usually 
the  suffering  is  made  intensively  as  well  as  extensively  infinite. 
Sometimes  degrees  are  allowed  in  suffering.  No  allowance 
is  made  for  ignorance,  or  want  of  opportunity  ;  for  inherited 
evil,  or  evil  resulting  from  force  of  circumstances.  The 
purest  and  best  of  men,  who  does  not  believe  the  precise 
Orthodox  theory  concerning  the  Trinity,  sits  in  hell  side  by 
side  with  Zingis  Khan,  who  murdered  in  cold  blood  hundreds 
of  tliousands  of  men,  women,  and  children,  marking  his 
bloody  route  by  pyramids  of  skulls.  The  unbaptized  child, 
who  goes  to  hell  because  of  the  original  sin  derived  from 
Adam,  is  exposed  to  God's  wrath  no  less  than  Pope  Alexan- 
der VI.,  who  outraged  every  law  of  God  and  man,  and  who, 
says  Machiavelli,  "  was  followed  to  the  tomb  by  the  holy 
feet  of  his  three  dear  companions  —  Luxmy,  Simony,  and 
Cruelty."  * 

*  The  latest  illustration  of  Orthodox  ideas  on  this  subject  we  have  met  with 
is  contained  in  a  little  tract  which  has  fallen  in  our  way,  containing  "  extracts 
from  a  sermon  addressed  to  the  students  in  the  United  Presbyterian  Theologi- 
cal Seminary  of  Xenia,  Ohio,  by  Kev.  William  Davidson."  It  begins  in  this 
Bomewhat  enigmatical  way  :  — 

"  It  is  an  unspeakably  terrible  thing  for  any  one  —  for  even  a  youth  or  a 
heathen  —  to  be  lost." 

Why  this  limiting  particle  "  even  "  is  introduced  is  not  explained.  It  seems 
to  be  implied  cither  that  a  youth  and  a  heathen  have  not  as  much  to  lose  as 
others,  or  else  that  we  are  not  bound  to  feel  so  much  for  their  loss  as  for  that  of 
others.  After  a  little  poetry  (which  we  omit,  as  it  is  altogether  too  stern  a 
matter  for  any  sentimental  ornament),  Mr.  Davidson  proceeds  :  — 

"  Nor  is  this  all  to  those  who  suffer  least.  It  is  not  only  the  loss  of  all,  and 
a  horrible  lake  of  ever-burning  fire,  but  there  are  horrible  objects,  tilling  every 
sense  and  every  faculty ;  and  there  arc  horrible  engines  and  instruments  of 
tofture.  There  are  the  '  chains  of  darkness,'  thick,  Iieavy,  hard,  and  smothering' 
as  the  gloom  of  blank  and  black  despair  —  chains  strong  as  the  cords  of  omnip- 
otence, hot  as  the  crisping  flames  of  vengeance,  indestructible  and  eternal  as 
Jnaticc.    With  chains  like  these,  every  iron  link  burning  into  the  throbbing 


358     ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

This  is  the  doctriue  which  every  denomination  and  sect  in 
Christendom,  except  the  Unitarians  and  Universalists,  main- 
tain as  essential  to  Orthodoxy.  It  is  but  a  year  or  two 
since  twenty-one  bishops  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church 

heart,  is  bound  each  doomed,  damned  soul,  on  a  bed  of  burning  marl,  under  an 
iron  roof,  riven  with  tempests,  and  dripping  with  torrents  of  unquenchable 
fire." 

The  object  of  the  preacher  being  to  make  as  terrific  a  picture  as  possible,  he 
accumulates  these  material  images  of  bodily  torment  in  order  to  excite  the 
imagination  to  the  utmost.  We  can  conceive  of  his  writing  these  sentences 
carefully  in  his  comfortable  study,  in  an  easy  chair,  by  the  side  of  a  cheerful 
fire,  with  a  smile  of  self-complacency,  as  he  selects  each  striking  expression. 
Then  he  proceeds  :  — 

"  Nor  is  this  all.  Unraortified  appetites,  hungry  as  death,  insatiable  as  the 
grave,  torture  it.  Every  passion  burning,  an  unsealed  volcano  in  the  heart. 
Every  base  lust  a  tiger  unchained  —  a  worm  undying,  let  loose  to  prey  on  soul 
and  body.  Pride,  vanity,  envy,  shame,  treachery,  deceit,  falsehood,  fell  re- 
venge, and  black  despair,  malice,  and  every  unholy  emotion,  are  so  many 
springs  of  excruciating  and  ever-increasing  agonies,  are  so  many  hot  and 
stifling  winds,  tossing  the  swooning,  sweltering  soul  on  waves  of  fire.  And 
there  will  be  deadly  hunger,  but  no  food;  parching  thirst,  but  no  water;  eter- 
nal fatigue,  but  no  rest;  eternal  lust  of  sensuous  and  intellectual  pleasures,  but 
no  gratification.  And  there  will  be  terrible  companions,  or  rather  foes,  there. 
Eternal  longings  after  society,  but  no  companion,  no  love,  and  no  sympathy 
there.  Every  one  utterly  selfish,  hateful,  and  hating.  Every  one  cunning, 
false,  malignant,  fierce,  fell,  and  devilish.  All  commingle  in  the  confusion  and 
the  carnage  of  one  wide-spread,  pitiless,  truceless,  desperate  strife.  And  there 
will  be  terrible  sights  and  sounds  there.  Fathers  and  sons,  pastors  and  people, 
husbands  and  wives,  brothers  and  sisters,  with  swollen  veins  and  bloodshot 
eyes,  straining  towards  each  other's  throats  and  hearts,  reprobate  men,  and 
devils  in  form  and  features,  hideous  to  as  great  a  degree  as  are  the  beauties  of 
the  blest  in  heaven  beautiful.  And  there  are  groans  and  curses,  and  everlast- 
ing wailings,  as  harsh  and  horrible  as  heaven's  songs,  shouts,  and  anthems  are 
sweet,  joyous,  and  enrapturing.  And  there  will  be  terrible  displays  of  the 
divine  power  and  skill,  and  infinitely  awful  displays  of  merciless  and  omnipo- 
tent justice,  in  the  punishment  of  that  rebel  crew,  that  generation  of  moral 
vipers  full  grown,  that  congregation  of  moral  monsters." 

All  this,  however,  is  not  enough.  It  is  necessary  to  go  further,  and  represent 
God  in  the  character  of  the  devil,  in  order  to  complete  the  picture. 

"  Upon  such  an  assembly,  God,  who  is  of  purer  eyes  than  to  behold  iniquity, 
cannot  look  but  with  utter  detestation.  His  wrath  shall  come  up  in  his  face. 
His  face  shall  be  red  in  his  anger.  He  will  whet  his  glittering  sword,  and  his 
hand  shall  take  hold  on  vengeance;  and  he  shall  recompense.  He  shall  launch 
forth  his  lightnings,  and  shoot  abroad  his  arrows.  He  shall  unseal  all  liia 
fountains,  and  pour  out  his  tumbling  cataracts  of  vengeance.  He  shall  build 
his  batteries  aloft,  and  thunder  upon  them  from  the  heavens.  His  eye  shall 
not  pity  them,  nor  shall  his  soul  spare  for  their  crying.  The  day  of  vengeance 
is  in  his  heart,  and  it  is  what  he  has  his  heart  set  on.    He  will  delight  in  it. 


FUTURE   PUNISHMENT.  359 

issued  a  declaratioQ  of  their  belief  that  this  doctrine  is  main- 
tained, without  reserve  or  qualilication,  by  the  Church  of 
EngLiud.  Only  recently  an  ecclesiastical  council  of  Con- 
gregationalists  refused  the  fellowship  of  the  churches  to  a 
gentleman  elected  as  its  pastor  by  the  Third  Congregational 
Church  in  Portland,  Maine.  In  the  report  of  the  result,  the 
council  says  that  it  believes  the  candidate  to  be  generally 
sound  in  his  belief,  and  exemplary  in  his  Christian  spirit, 
and  heartily  extends  to  him  its  Christian  sympathy.     But  it 

He  will  show  his  wrath,  and  make  his  power  known.  That  infinite  power  has 
never  been  fully  made  kno\vn  yer;  but  it  will  bo  tlieii.  It  is  but  a  little  that 
we  see  of  it  in  creation  and  providence;  but  we  shall  see  it,  fully  revealed,  in 
the  destruction  of  that  rebel  crew.  lie  will  tread  tlieni  in  Ins  anger,  and  tram- 
ple them  in  his  fury,  and  will  stain  his  raiment  with  their  blood.  The  cup  of 
the  wine  of  his  fierce  wrath  shall  contain  no  mixture  of  mercy  at  all.  And 
they  will  not  be  able  to  resist  that  wrath,  nor  will  they  be  able  to  endure  it; 
but  tlioy  shall,  in  soul  and  body,  sink  wholly  down  into  the  second  death.  The 
Iron  liocl  of  omnipotent  and  triumphing  justice,  pitiless  and  rejoicing-,  shall 
tread  them  down,  and  crush  tlieni  lower  still,  and  lower  ever,  in  that  burning 
pit  which  knows  no  bottoni.  All  this,  and  more  and  worse,  do  the  Scriptures 
declare;  and  that  preacher  who  hesitates  to  proclaim  it  has  forsworn  his  soul, 
and  is  a  traitor  to  his  trust." 

Now,  it  is  simple  truth  to  say  that  the  blasphemer  and  profane  swearer  who 
spends  fifty  years  in  cursing  God  and  Christ  is  not  so  blasphemous  as  the  man 
who  writes  such  sentences  as  these  about  the  Almighty,  and  utters  them  to 
young  men  as  «  preparation  for  their  work  iu  the  ministry.  The  i^eople  of 
Sodom  and  Gomorrah  shall  rise  up  iu  the  day  of  judgment  against  those  who 
speak  thus  of  God,  and  shall  condemn  them.  The  Pagans,  who  represent  their 
gods  as  horrid  idols,  pleased  with  blood  and  slaughter,  have  an  excuse,  which 
Mr.  Davidson  has  not,  for  they  do  not  have  the  gospel  of  the  Lord  Jesus  in  their 
hands.    Thus  he  continues  :  — 

"  And  all  this  shall  be  forei-er.  It  shall  never,  never  end.  (Matt.  ch.  2o.)  The 
wicked  go  away  into  everlasting  torments.  This  is  a  bitter  ingredient  in  their 
cup  of  wormwood,  a  more  terrible  thing  in  their  terrible  doom.  If  after  endur- 
ing it  all  for  twice  ten  thousand  times  ten  thousand  years,  they  might  have  a 
deli  rerance,  or  at  least  some  abatement,  it  were  less  terrible.  But  this  may 
never,  never  be.  Their  estate  is  remediless.  There  is  a  great  gulf  fixed,  and 
they  cannot  pass  from  thence.  Or,  if  after  suffering  all  this  as  many  years  as 
there  arj  aqueous  particles  in  air  and  ocean,  they  might  then  be  delivered,  or 
il',  after  repeating  that  amazing  period  as  many  times  as  there  are  sand-grains 
in  the  globe,  they  might  then  be  delivered,  there  would  be  some  hope.  Or,  if 
you  multiply  this  latter  sum  —  too  infinite  to  be  expressed  by  figures,  and  too 
limitless  to  be  comprehended  by  angels — by  the  number  of  atoms  that  com- 
pose the  universe,  and  there  might  be  deliverance  when  they  had  passed  those 
amazing,  abysmal  gulfs  of  duration,  then  there  would  be  some  hope.  But  no  t 
when  all  is  euflfered  and  all  is  past,  still  all  beyond  is  eternity." 


360    oethodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

declines  to  install  him  as  pastor,  because  it  "  understands 
him  as  saying,  that  he  does  not  know  but  there  may  be 
another  state  of  probation  and  offer  of  salvation,  after  death, 
for  all  to  whom  Christ  is  not  personally  preached  ;  and  that, 
whilst  believing  in  a  future  retribution,  he  says  that  the  ever- 
lasting punishment  of  the  wicked  may  be  an  extinction  of  the 
wicked  by  annihilation."  So  that  a  mere  doubt  on  this  sub- 
ject is  considered  a  sufficient  reason,  by  the  most  advanced 
and  liberal  of  the  whole  Orthodox  body  at  the  present  day, 
for  refusing  church  fellowship. 

The  American  Tract  Society  floods  the  land  with  loose 
leaves,  all  appealing  to  the  fear  of  an  eternal  hell.  We  have 
one  before  us  now,  called  "  Are  you  insured?"  which  repre- 
sents Christianity  as  a  contrivance  for  escaping  from  ever- 
lasting torment,  as  a  spiritual  insurance  office,  where  one 
must  "  take  out  a  policy,"  and  so  escape  everlasting  fire.* 

There  is  no  theological  journal,  bearing  the  Orthodox 
name,  which  is  more  rational  and  liberal  than  the  "  New 
York  Independent."  But  in  its  issue  of  January  5,  1860, 
it  speaks  of  future  endless  misery  thus,  saying  that  there 
is  a  "vast  amount  and  weight  of  evidence  to  the  point  — 
evidence  enough  to  prove  it,  if  provable  ;  all  nature,  all  law, 
all  revelation  uttering  the  doctrine,  so  that  it  is  an  amazing 

*  To  show  how  some  Roman  Catholics  write  in  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth 
century,  we  quote  the  following  from  <a  Roman  Catholic  book,  published  in 
England,  by  Rev.  J.  Furniss,  being  especially  "  a  book  for  children."  Wish- 
ing to  spare  our  readers  such  horrors,  we  put  it  here,  advising  no  one  of  weak 
nerves  to  read  its  atrocious  descriptions. 

"  The  fourth  dungeon  is  '  the  boiling  kettle.'  Listen  :  there  is  a  sound  like 
that  of  a  kettle  boihng.  Is  it  really  a  kettle  which  is  boiling.''  No.  Then  what 
is  it?  Hear  what  it  is.  The  blood  is  boiling  in  the  scalded  veins  of  that  boy  ; 
the  brain  is  boiling  and  bubbling  in  his  head;  the  marrow  is  boiling  in  his 
bones.  The  fifth  dungeon  is  the  '  red-hot  oven,'  in  which  is  a  little  child. 
Hear  how  it  screams  to  come  out;  see  how  it  turns  and  twists  itself  about  in 
the  fire;  it  beats  its  head  against  the  roof  of  Ihe  oven.  It  stamps  its  little  feet 
on  the  flcor  of  the  oven.  To  this  child  God  was  very  good.  Very  likely 
God  saw  that  this  child  would  get  worse  and  worse,  and  would  never  repent, 
and  80  it  would  have  to  be  punished  much  more  in  hell.  So  Ood  in  his  mercy 
called  it  out  of  the  world  in  its  early  childhood.'" 


FUTURE    PUNISHMENT.  361 

Stretch  and  energy  of  unbelief  not  to  believe  it,  implying  a 
moral  state  and  position  that  will  not  believe  it  on  any  testi- 
mony, however  clearly  and  unqualifiedly,  even  to  the  exhaus- 
tion of  the  capabilities  of  language,  God  himself  may  declare 
and  affirm  it." 

There  is  evidently  an  energetic  attempt  made  in  some 
quarters  to  revive  the  decaying  belief  in  the  doctrine  of  ever- 
lasting punishment  in  the  future  state,  as  a  penalty  for  the 
sins  of  this.  Dr.  Thompson,  of  New  York,  has  published  a 
work  to  this  end,  called  "  Love  and  Penalty."  Dr.  J.  P. 
Thompson,  the  author  of  this  book,  is  considered  the  leader 
of  New  Haven  theology  —  the  Elisha  on  whose  shoulders 
the  mantle  of  Dr.  Taylor,  of  New  Haven,  has  fallen.  Dr. 
Nehemiah  Adams,  of  Boston,  has  labored  in  the  same  field, 
exerting  himself  to  prove  this  doctrine  in  various  tracts  and 
other  works.  Professor  Hovey,  of  the  Baptist  Seminary  of 
Newton,  has  published  a  little  book  on  the  same  subject. 

It  is  probably  thought  dangerous  by  these  gentlemen  to 
relax  at  all  the  terrors  of  futurity.  And,  no  doubt,  if  all 
those  who  have  been  restrained  from  evil  by  fear  of  eternal 
punishment  were  to  lose  that  belief  suddenly,  the  conse- 
quences, at  first,  would  be  sometimes  bad.  If  you  have 
exerted  your  whole  force  in  producing  fear  of  hell,  instead 
of  fear  of  sin,  then,  the  terror  of  hell  being  taken  away,  men 
might  rush  at  first  into  license.  But  the  dread  of  a  future 
hell  is  by  no  means  so  efiicacious  a  motive  as  is  often  thought. 
We  become  hardened  to  everything,  and  neither  the  clergy- 
man nor  his  parish  eat  any  less  heartily  of  their  Sunday 
dinner,  nor  sleep  any  less  soundly  on  Sunday  night,  in  con- 
sequence of  the  terrible  descriptions  of  eternal  torments  con- 
tained in  the  morning's  sermon.* 


*  We  take  the  following  from  the  "  Monthly  Religions  Magazine  : "  — 
"The  '  Country  Parson,'  in  his  late  work,  the  '  Autumn  Holidays,'  contends 
that  the  fear  of  future  punishment  in  another  world  has  little  influence  in  de- 
terring from  crime.    He  ought  to  have  added,  that  the  reason  may  be,  that 

31 


362'        orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

§  3.  Apparent  Contradictions,  both  in  Scripture  and  Rear 
soriy  in  Regard  to  this  Doctrine.  —  Beside  the  practical  motive 
for  maintaining  this  doctrine,  which  we  have  intimated,  there 
are  also  scriptural  and  philosophical  reasons.  Scripture  and 
reason  both  do,  in  fact,  seem  to  teach  opposite  doctrines  on 
this  subject.  There  are  passages  in  the  New  Testament 
which  appear  to  teach  never-ending  suffering,  and  others 
which  appear  to  teach  a  final,  universal  restoration.  It  is 
written,  "  These  shall  go  away  into  eternal  punishment ; " 
but  it  is  also  written,  that  Christ  "  shall  reign  till  all  things 
are  subdued  unto  him  ;  "  when  "  the  Son  also  himself  shall 
be  subject  to  Him  who  did  put  all  things  under  him,  that 
God  may  be  all  in  all."  As  the  same  word  is  used  to  ex- 
press the  way  in  which  all  enemies  are  to  be  subject  to 
Christ,  and  the  way  in  which  Christ  himself  is  to  be  subject  to 
God,  it  follows  that  the  enemies,  when  subjected,  shall  be 
friends.  It  is  said  that  the  wicked  shall  be  punished  "  with 
everlasting  destruction  from  the  presence  of  God  ; "  but  it  is 


there  is  so  little  belief  in  any  spiritual  world  whatever,  among-  men  of  grosser 
sensuality;  and  that  future  punishment,  as  it  Is  preached  in  the  old  theology, 
is  so  arbitrary  aa  to  seem  unreal,  and  is  losing  Its  power  over  all  thinking 
minds.  The  following  case  is  cited  from  the  experience  of  a  Scotch  minister. 
No  ministers,  let  it  be  remembered,  preach  the  literal  flames  of  a  local  hell  in 
tones  more  awful  than  they. 

"  His  parishioners  were  sadly  addicted  to  drinking  to  excess.  Men  and 
women  were  given  alike  to  this  degrading  vice.  He  did  all  he  could  to  repress 
it,  but  in  vain.  For  many  years  he  warned  the  drunkards.  In  the  most  solemn 
manner,  of  the  doom  they  might  expect  in  another  world ;  but,  so  far  as  he 
knew,  not  a  pot  of  ale  or  glass  of  spirits  the  less  was  drunk  In  the  parish  in  con- 
sequence of  his  denunciations.  Future  woe  melted  Into  mist  in  the  presence  of 
a  replenished  jug  or  a  market-day.  A  happy  thought  struck  the  clergyman. 
In  the  neighboring  town,  there  was  a  clever  medical  man,  a  vehement  teetotal- 
er ;  him  he  summoned  to  his  aid.  The  doctor  came,  and  delivered  a  lecture  on 
thephysical  consequences  of  drunkenness,  illustrating  his  lecture  with  large  dia- 
grams, which  gave  shocking  representations  of  the  stomach,  lungs,  heart,  and 
other  vital  organs  as  affected  by  alcohol.  These  things  came  home  to  the 
drunkards,  who  had  not  cared  a  rush  for  final  perdition.  The  efiTect  produced 
was  tremendous.  Almost  all  the  men  and  women  of  the  parish  took  the  total 
abstinence  pledge;  and  since  that  day  drunkenness  has  nearly  ceased  in  that 
parish.  Nor  was  the  improvement  evanescent;  it  has  lasted  two  or  three 
years." 


FUTURE   PUNISHMENT.  363 

also,  said  that  '•  iu  the  dispeusatioa  ot"  the  fulness  of  times, 
God  will  gather  ia  one  all  things  iu  Christ,  both  which  are 
in  heaven  and  on  earth  ; "  and  "  that  at  the  name  of  Jesus 
every  knee  should  bow,  in  heaven,  in  earth,  and  under  the 
earth ;  and  that  every  tongue  should  confess  that  Jesus 
Christ  is  Lord,  to  the  glory  of  God  the  Father."  It  is  said 
of  the  wicked,  that  "their  worm  never  dies,  and  their  fire  is 
not  quenched ; "  but  it  is  also  said  that  "  it  pleased  the 
Father,  having  made  peace  through  the  blood  of  the  cross, 
by  Christ  to  reconcile  all  things  unto  himself,  whether  they 
be  things  in  earth  or  things  in  heaven."  So  that  Scripture, 
at  first  sight,  seems  to  teach  both  eternal  punishment  and 
universal  restoration. 

There  is  a  similar  contradiction  on  this  subject,  if  consid- 
ered in  the  light  of  pure  reason.  When  looked  at  from  the 
divine  attributes,  the  unavoidable  conclusion  seems  to  be, 
that  all  men  must  be  finally  saved.  For  God  is  infinitely 
benevolent,  and  therefore  must  wish  to  save  all ;  is  in- 
finitely wise,  and  therefore  must  know  how  to  save  all ;  is 
infinitely  powerful,  and  therefore  must  be  able  to  overcome 
all  difficulties  in  the  way  of  saving  all :  hence  all  must 
be  saved.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  when  we  consider  the 
subject  from  the  position  of  man's  nature,  an  opposite  con- 
clusion seems  to  follow.  For  man,  being  free,  is  able  to 
choose  either  evil  or  good  at  any  moment ;  and,  as  long  as 
he  continues  to  be  essentially  man,  he  must  retain  this  free- 
dom ;  and  therefore,  at  auy  period  of  his  future  existence, 
however  remote,  he  may  prefer  evil  to  good  —  that  is,  may 
prefer  hell  to  heaven.  But  God  will  not  compel  him  to  be 
good  against  his  will  (for  unwilling  goodness  is  not  good- 
ness) ;  and  therefore  it  follows  that  there  is  no  point  of  time 
in  the  infinite  future  of  which  we  can  certainly  say  that  then 
all  men  will  be  saved. 

Of  course  these  seeming  contradictions  of  Scripture  and 
antinomies  of  reason  are  not  real  contradictions.     God  does 


364    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

not  contradict  himself  either  in  revelation  or  in  reason. 
Whether  we  can  reconcile  such  antagonisms  noiy,  or  not,  we 
know  that  they  will  be  reconciled.  Meantime,  it  is  our  duty 
to  disbelieve  whatever  is  dishonorable  to  God,  or  opposed  to 
the  character  ascribed  to  him  by  Jesus  Christ.  Christ  has 
taught  us  to  regard  God  as  our  Father.  It  is  our  duty  to 
refuse  credence  to  any  doctrine  concerning  him  which  is 
plainly  opposed  to  this  character.  If  I  have  formed  my 
opinion  of  my  friend's  character  from  a  large  experience,  I 
ought  to  refuse  to  believe,  even  on  good  evidence,  anything 
opposed  to  it.  What  is  faith  in  man,  or  in  God,  good  for,  that 
is  unable  to  resist  evil  reports  concerning  them?  If  I  am 
told  that  my  friend  has  become  a  thief  or  a  swindler,  and 
he  who  tells  me  says,  "  I  know  that  it  is  so  —  here  is  the 
evidence,"  I  reply,  "  I  do  not  care  for  your  evidence.  I 
know  that  it  is  impossible."  So,  if  all  the  churches  in  the 
world.  Catholic  and  Protestant,  tell  me  that  Jesus  teaches 
everlasting  punishment  inflicted  by  God  for  the  sins  of  this 
life,  and  produce  chapter  and  verse  in  support  of  their  state- 
ment, I  reply,  "  If  I  have  learned  anything  about  God  from 
the  teachings  of  Jesus,  it  is  that  your  assertion  is  impossible. 
About  the  meaning  of  these  passages  you  may  be  mistaken, 
for  the  letter  killeth ;  but  I  cannot  be  mistaken  in  regard  to 
"  the  fatherly  character  of  the  Almighty." 

These  contradictious  we  shall  consider  in  a  paper  printed 
in  the  Appendix  (an  examination  of  Dr.  Nehemiah  Adams's 
tract  on  the  "  Reasonableness  of  Everlasting  Punishment"). 
At  present  we  will  only  say  that  we  should  hold  it  less  dis- 
honorable to  God  to  deny  his  existence  than  to  believe  this 
doctrine  concerning  him.  We  think  that  in  the  last  day  it 
will  appear  that  the  atheist  has  done  less  to  dishonor  the 
name  of  God  than  those  who  persistently  teach  this  view. 
For  what  says  Lord  Bacon  ?  (Essays,  XVII.  Of  Superstition.) 
"  It  were  better  to  have  no  opinion  of  God  at  all  than  such  an 
opinion  as  is  unworthy  of  him  ;  for  the  one  is  unbelief,  the 


FUTURE  PUNISHMENT.  365 

other  is  contumely  ;  aud  certaiuly  superstitiou  is  the  reproach 
of  the  Deity.  Plutarch  saith  well  to  that  purpose.  '  Surely,' 
saith  he,  '  I  had  rather  a  great  deal  men  should  say  there 
were  no  such  man  at  all  as  Plutarch,  than  that  they  should 
say  there  was  one  Plutarch  that  would  eat  his  children  as 
soon  as  they  were  born,'  as  the  poets  speak  of  Saturn.  And 
as  the  contumely  is  greater  towards  God,  so  is  the  danger 
greater  towards  men." 

The  doctrine  of  everlasting  punishment,  being  essentially  a 
heathen  and  not  a  Christian  doctrine,  cannot  do  any  Chris- 
tian good  to  any  one.  It  is  the  want  of  faith 'in  the  Church 
which  makes  it  afraid  of  giving  it  up.  The  Christian 
Church  has  not  faith  enough  to  believe  in  the  power  of  truth 
and  love.  It  still  thinks  that  men  must  be  frightened  into 
goodness,  or  driven  into  it.  Fear  is  a  becoming  and  useful 
motive  no  less  than  hope ;  but  fear  of  Avhat  ?  Not  fear  of 
God ;  but  fear  of  sin,  fear  of  ourselves,  fear  of  temptation. 
To  be  afraid  of  God  never  did  any  one  any  good.  These 
doctrines  drive  men  away  from  God ;  or,  if  they  drive  them 
to  God,  drive  them  as  slaves,  as  sycophants,  as  servants,  not 
as  sons.  We  are  saved  by  becoming  the  sons  of  God ;  but 
you  cannot  drive  a  man  into  sonship  by  terror.  You  may 
make  him  profess  religion,  and  go  thi*ough  ceremonies,  and 
have  an  outward  form  of  service  ;  but  you  cannot  make  him 
love  God  by  means  of  fear. 

But  good  men  teach  these  things,  no  doubt.  Men  far  bet- 
ter than  most  of  us  believe  them  and  teach  them.  It  always 
has  been  so.  The  best  men  have  always  been  the  chief  sup- 
porters of  bad  doctrines.  A  good  man,  humble  and  modest,  is 
apt  to  shrink  from  doubting  or  opposing  what  the  Church  has 
taught.  He  accepts  it,  aud  teaches  it  too.  When  God  wants 
a  reformer,  he  does  not  take  one  of  these  good,  modest,  humble 
men.  He  does  not  take  a  saifit.  He  takes  a  man  who  has 
ever  so  much  will,  a  little  obstinacy,  and  a  great  love  of 
fighting  ;  and  he  makes  the  wrath  of  such  a  man  to  serve  him 
31* 


366    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

Neither  St.  Teresa  nor  Fenelon  could  have  reformed  the 
Catholic  Church.  It  took  rough  old  Martin  Luther  and  hard- 
hearted John  Calvin  to  do  it.  The  first  Universalists,  the 
Abolitionists,  all  reformers,  are  necessarily  men  of  that  sort. 
They  are  rude  debaters,  not  standing  on  ceremony  or  polite- 
ness. They  are  hard-headed  logicians,  going  straight  to 
their  point,  careless  of  elegances  and  proprieties.  They  are 
God's  pioneers,  rough  backwoodsmen,  hewing  their  way  with 
the  axe  through  the  wilderness.  After  them  shall  come  the 
peaceful  farmer,  with  plough  and  spade,  to  turn  the  land  into 
wheat  fields,  orchards,  and  gardens. 

§  4.  Everlasting  Punishment  limits  the  Sovereignty  of  God. 
—  It  is  certain  that  the  doctrine  of  eternal  punishment,  in 
the  common  form,  can  only  be  maintained  by  giving  up  some 
of  the  infinite  attributes  of  the  Almighty.  If  punishment  is 
to  exist  without  end  ;  if  hell  is  always  to  co-exist  with  heaven  ; 
if  certain  beings  are  to  be  continued  forever  in  existence 
merely  as  sinful  suflferers,  —  then,  it  is  clear,  God  is  not 
omnipotent.  He  shares  his  throne  forever  with  Satan. 
Satan  and  God  divide  between  them  the  universe.  God 
reigns  in  heaven,  Satan  in  hell.  God  desires  that  all  shall 
be  saved ;  but  this  desire  is  absolutely  and  forever  defeated 
by  a  fate  greater  than  Deity.  Law  divorced  from  love  — 
that  is,  nature  in  its  old  Pagan  aspect  —  is  higher  than  God. 
God  is  not  the  Almighty  to  any  one  who  really  believes  eter- 
nal punishment.  God  is  not  the  Sovereign  of  the  universe, 
but  only  of  a  part  of  it.  The  doctrine  of  eternal  punish- 
ment, in  its  common  form,  does,  therefore,  virtually  dethrone 
God.* 

It  is,  in  fact,  impossible  to  conceive  of  an  eternal  hell  co- 
existing with  an  eternal  heaven,  without  also  seeing  that  it 


*  So  Erigena  (quoted  by  Strauss),  De  Divis  Nat.  "  Vera  ratio  docet,  nullum 
contrarium  divinoe  bonitati  vitseque  ac  beatitudini  posse  .esse  cooternum;  diviaa 
siquidcm  bouitas  consumct  malitiam,  ssterna  vita  absorbet  mortem,  beatitudo 
miseriam." 


FUTURE   PUNISHMENT.  367 

limits  eterually  the  diviae  Omuipotence ;  for  the  omnipo- 
teuco  of  God  is  in  carrying  out  his  will  to  have  all  men  saved 
by  becoming  holy.  Unless  God's  laws  are  obeyed,  God  is 
not  obeyed  ;  and  he  is  not  sovereign  if  not  obeyed.  Hell  is 
a  condition  of  things  hostile  to  God's  will :  it  is  a  permanent 
and  successful  rebellion  of  a  part  of  the  universe.  It  is  no 
answer  to  say,  that  it  is  shut  up,  and  restrained,  and  made 
to  suffer ;  for  it  is  not  conquered.  God  has  conquered  sin 
only  when  he  has  reduced  it  to  obedience.  Hell  is  no  more 
subject  to  God  than  the  Confederate  States,  during  the  re- 
bellion, were  subject  to  the  United  States  government. 
They  were  shut  up  by  a  blockade  ;  they  were  restrained  by 
great  armies  and  navies ;  they  were  made  to  suffer ;  but 
they  were  not  reduced  to  submission  and  obedience. 

Nor  is  it  any  answer  to  say,  that  the  existence  of  sin  and 
suffering  hereafter  no  more  limits  God's  omnipotence  than 
their  existence  here  and  now  limits  his  omnipotence.  For  the 
question  is  of  eternal  suffering.  Temporal  suffering  here- 
after, we  grant,  is  no  objection  to  the  divine  Omnipotence. 
Limited  and  finite  evil,  in  this  world  or  the  other,  is  no  phil- 
osophical difficulty;  and  for  this  reason  —  that  finite  evil, 
when  compared  with  infinite  good,  becomes  logically  and 
mathematically  no  evil.  The  finite  disappears  in  relation  to 
the  infinite.  All  the  sufferings  and  sins  of  earth,  through  all 
ages,  are  strictly  nothing  when  viewed  in  the  light  of  the 
eternal  joy  and  holiness  which  are  to  result  from  them.  This 
is  a  postulate  of  pure  reason.  Make  evil  finite,  and  good  in- 
finite,—  make  evil  temporal,  and  good  eternal,  —  and  evil 
ceases  to  be  anything.  But  make  evil  eternal,  as  is  done  by 
this  doctrine,  and  then  w-e  have  Manicheism  —  an  infinite 
dualism  —  on  the  throne  of  the  universe. 

§  5.  Everlasting  Punishment  contradicts  the  Fatherly  Love 
of  God.  —  This  doctrine  is  a  relapse  on  Paganism,  and  de- 
rived from  it.  It  has  nothing  to  do  with  Christianity,  except 
to  corrupt  it.     No  man  was  ever  made  better  by  believing 


368    oethodoxy:  its  truths  and  ereors. 

it :  multitudes  have  been  made  worse.  It  attributes  to  our 
heavenly  Father  conduct  that,  if  done  by  the  worst  of  men, 
would  add  a  shade  of  increased  wickedness  to  their  charac- 
ter. It  assumes  that  God  has  made  intelligent  creatures 
with  the  intention  of  tormenting  some  of  them  forever.  It 
assumes  that  those  who  are  thus  created,  exposed  to  this 
awful  risk,  are  to  be  thus  tormented,  unless  they  happen  to 
pass  through  what  is  called  an  Orthodox  conversion  in  this 
short  earthly  life.  God  keeps  them  alive  forever  in  order  to 
torture  them  forever. 

The  barbarity  of  this  opinion  exceeds  all  power  of  language 
to  express.  We  are  accustomed  to  mourn  over  the  anguish 
and  misery  that  are  in  this  world.  The  problem  of  earthly 
evil  has  been  a  burden  and  anxiety  to  good  men  in  all  times, 
a  great  question  for  thinkers  in  all  ages.  The  only  satisfac- 
tory solution  is,  that  it  is  temporary  and  educational ;  that  it 
is  to  pass  away,  and,  in  passing,  to  create  a  higher  joy  and 
goodness  than  could  otherwise  have  come.  But  the  doctrine 
of  everlasting  punishment  not  only  annuls  this  explanation, 
and  makes  it  impossible  to  explain  earthly  evil,  but  adds  to 
it  a  tenfold  greater  mystery.  The  fatherly  character  of  God 
disappears  in  Pagan  darkness,  in  view  of  this  horrid  doctrine  ; 
for  the  everlasting  suffering  of  one  human  being  contains  in 
itself  more  evil  than  the  accumulated  sufferings  of  all  mankind 
from  the  creation  of  the  Avorld  to  the  end  of  it.  Add  to- 
gether all  the  sicknesses,  bereavements,  disappointments,  of 
all  mankind ;  all  the  wars,  famines,  pestilences,  that  have 
tormented  humanity  ;  add  to  these  all  the  mental  and  moral 
pangs  produced  by  selfishness  and  sin  in  all  ages,  and  all 
that  are  to  be  to  the  end  of  time,  —  and  these  all  combined 
are  logically  and  mathematically  nothing,  compared  with  the 
sufferings  of  one  human  being  destined  to  be  everlastingly 
punished.  For  all  temporal  sufferings  added  together  are 
finite ;  but  this  is  infinite. 

Now,  the  being  who  could  inflict  such  torture  as  this  is 


1 


FUTURE   PUNISHMENT.  369 

not  the  God  aud  Father  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  There 
may  be  some  deity  of  cruehy,  some  incarnation  of  wrath  and 
despotism,  iu  the  Hindoo  Pantheon,  capable  of  such  terrific 
wickedness.  It  is  no  answer  to  say  that  God  inflicts  suffer- 
ing now  in  this  workl,  and  therefore  he  may  inflict  everlast- 
ing suffering  in  the  other ;  for  these  are  all  finite ;  that  is 
infinite.  Finite  suffering  may  result  in  greater  good,  may 
be  an  education  to  good ;  but  everlasting  suffering  cannot. 
The  finite  and  infinite  cannot  be  compared  together.  There 
is  no  analogy  between  them. 

The  God  of  the  New  Testament  is  our  Father.  If  he  in- 
flicts suffering,  it  is  for  our  good  ;  "  not  for  his  pleasure,  but 
for  our  profit,  that  we  may  be  partakers  of  his  holiness." 
All  earthly  suffering  finds  this  solution,  and  accords  with  the 
fatherly  character  of  God  in  this  point  of  view.  Much,  no 
doubt,  cannot  be  now  fully  understood.  "We  do  not  see  how 
it  tends  to  good  ;  but  all  suffering  that  ends  may  end  in  good. 
Suffering  that  does  not  end  cannot  end  in  good. 

If  human  beings  are  everlastingly  punished,  it  must  either 
be  that  they  go  on  sinning  forever,  and  cannot  repent,  lose 
all  power  of  repentance,  and  so  cease  to  be  moral  agents,  or 
else  that  they  retain  the  power  of  repenting,  and  therefore 
may  repent.  In  the  first  case,  G^d  continues  to  punish  for- 
ever those  who  have  ceased  to  sin,  because  their  freedom  and 
moral  power  have  ceased  ;  or  else  he  punishes  forever  those 
who  have  repented,  and  so  ceased  sinning.  In  either  case, 
God  must  punish  everlastingly  those  who  have  ceased  to  be 
sinners  ;  which  is  incredible. 

If  God  is  a  Father,  he  is  at  least  as  good  as  the  best  earth- 
ly father.  Now,  what  father  or  mother  would  ever  consent 
to  place  a  child  in  a  situation  where  there  was  even  a  chance 
of  its  running  such  an  awful  risk  ?  God  has  created  us  with 
these  liabilities  to  sin ;  he  has  (according  to  Orthodoxy) 
chosen  and  determined  that  we  shall  be  born  wholly  prone  to 
evil,  and  sure  to  fall  into  eternal  and  unending  ruin,  unlesa 


370     OETHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

he  baves  us  by  a  special  act  of  grace.  "  What  man  among 
you,  being  a  father,"  would  do  so?  Custom  dulls  our  sense 
to  these  horrors.  Let  us  therefore  imagine  a  case  far  less 
terrible.  Suppose  that  a  number  of  parents  should  establish 
a  school,  to  which  to  send  their  children.  Suppose  they 
should  arrange  a  code  of  laws  for  the  school  of  such  a  strin- 
gent character  that  all  the  children  are  sure  to  break  it. 
Under  the  school  are  vaults  containing  instruments  of  tor- 
ture. For  each  offence  against  the  laws  of  the  school  (of- 
fences which  the  children  cannot  fail  to  commit)  they  are  to 
be  punished  by  imprisonment  for  life  in  these  cells,  with  daily 
torture,  from  racks,  thumb-screws,  and  the  like.  A  few  of 
them  are  to  be  selected  from  the  rest,  not  for  any  merit  of 
their  own,  but  by  an  arbitrary  decree  of  the  parents,  and  are 
to  be  rewarded  (not  for  their  superior  good  conduct,  but  ac- 
cording to  the  caprice  of  the  parents)  with  every  luxury  and 
privilege.  Among  these  pi'ivileges  is  included  that  of  taking 
a  daily  walk  through  the  cells,  and  witnessing  the  horrible 
sufferings  of  their  brothers  and  companions,  and  hearing  their 
shrieks  of  anguish,  and  praising  the  justice  of  their  pai'ents 
in  thus  punishing  some  and  rewarding  the  rest. 

But  this,  you  may  say,  is  not  a  parallel  case.  No,  we 
grant  it  is  not,  for  what  are  these  torments  to  that  of  a  never- 
ending  futurity  ?  They  are  all  as  nothing.  Therefore  every 
such  comparison  must  utterly  fail  of  doing  justice  to  the 
diabolic  cruelty  ascribed  to  the  Almighty  by  this  Orthodox 
doctrine. 

"  But  what  right,"  says  the  Orthodox  defender  of  this  doc- 
trine, "  have  we  to  reason  in  this  way  concerning  the  divine 
proceedings,  by  the  analogy  of  earthly  parents?  What  right 
have  we  to  compare  God's  doings  with  those  of  a  human 
father  ?  "  No  right,  perhaps,  as  philosophers  ;  but  as  Chris- 
tians we  have  not  only  the  right  to  do  it,  but  it  is  our  duty 
to  do  so.  Jesus  has  himself  taught  us  to  use  this  analogy, 
in  order  to  acquire  confidence  in  God's  ways,  and  to  assure 


FUTURE   PUNISHMENT.  871 

ourselves  that  God  cauuot  fail  of  acting  as  we  should  expect 
a  good  and  wise  earthly  parent  to  act.  "  What  man  is  there 
of  ?/0M,  whom,  if  his  son  ask  bread,  will  he  give  him  a  stone  ? 
Or  if  he  ask  a  fish,  will  he  give  him  a  serpent?  If  ye  then, 
being  evil,  know  how  to  give  good  gifts  unto  your  children, 
how  much  more  shall  your  Father,  which  is  in  heaven,  give 
good  things  to  them  that  ask  him?"  (Matt.  7:9-11.) 
Jesus  authorizes  and  commands  us  to  reason  from  the  pa- 
rental nature  in  man  to  that  in  God.  Instead  of  simply 
assuring  us  of  it,  on  the  ground  of  his  own  authority  to  teach 
us ;  instead  of  saying,  "  Believe  this,  because  I  say  it,"  he 
says,  "  Believe  it,  because  it  accords  with  your  own  convic- 
tions and  with  human  nature." 

§  6.  Attempts  to  modifij  and  soften  the  Doctrine  of  Ever- 
lasting Punishment.  —  The  reasons  for  the  late  efforts  to  sup- 
port this  terrific  doctrine  are  probably  to  be  found  in  a  wide- 
spread and  increasing  disbelief  concerning  it,  pervading  the 
churches  nominally  Orthodox.  This  has  come  from  the  grow- 
ing intelligence  and  progressive  movements  of  thought  in  the 
Christian  Church.  The  evidences  of  this  belief  are  numer- 
ous and  increasing.  Those  who  reject  the  Orthodox  view 
are  a  numerous  body,  but  divided  into  several  parties. 
There  are  the  old-fashioned  Universalists,  a  valiant  race, — 
men  of  war  from  their  youth,  —  who,  under  the  lead  of  such 
men  as  Hosea  Ballou  and  Thomas  Whittemore,  have  spent 
their  lives  in  fighting  the  doctrine  of  everlasting  punishment. 
Very  naturally,  perhaps,  they  went  to  the  opposite  extreme 
of  opinion,  and  denied  all  future  suffering.  But  this  view 
has,  we  think,  ceased  to  be  the  prevailing  one  among  the 
Universalists.  The  doctrine  of  ultimate  restoration  has  very 
generally  taken  its  place.  This  doctrine  also  prevails  widely 
in  other  denominations  ;  not  only  among  the  liberal  bodies, 
like  the  Unitarians,  but  also  among  Methodists,  Presbyte- 
rians, and  Congregationalists.  It  has  widely  spread,  as  is 
well  known,  in  Germany.     It  was  held  by  Schleiermacher, 


372     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

the  father  of  modern  German  theology.  It  tinges  the  "writ- 
ings of  feuch  Orthodox  men  as  Tholuck,  Hahn,  and  Olshausen. 
Others  profess  to  believe  in  everlasting  punishment,  but  make 
it  a  merely  negative  consequence  of  lost  time  and  opportuni- 
ty :  one  will  be  always  worse  off  hereafter  in  consequence  of 
the  neglect  of  duty.  Others  follow  Swedenborg,  and  make 
the  sufferings  of  hell  rather  agreeable  than  otherwise  to  those 
who  bear  them. 

Various  ineffectual  attempts  have  indeed  been  made,  in  all 
ages  of  the  Church,  to  soften  the  austerity  of  this  doctrine. 
From  the  days  of  Origen,  these  merciful  doctors  *  have  al- 
ways been  trying  to  soften  this  austere  dogma,  but  ineffectu- 
ally ;  for  the  dread  of  an  eternal  hell  has  been  one  of  the 
chief  motives  Avhich  the  Church  has  used  in  converting  men 
from  sin  .to  holiness.  Any  suggestion  of  the  possibility  of 
future  restoration  would,  it  is  feared,  cut  the  sinews  of  effec- 
tive preaching.  For  the  baptized  who  are  not  fit  for  heaven 
the  Roman  Catholic  Church  has  established,  indeed,  a  tem- 
porary hell,  with  torments  of  an  inferior  sort ;  for  bad  Cath- 
olics there  is  purgatory,  with  the  hope  of  ultimate  escape 
from  it ;  but  for  the  unbaptized  heathen,  for  heretics,  and  for 
excommunicated  persons,  there  is  nothing  but  eternal  pun- 
ishment. 

Many,  in  all  ages,  have  made  the  everlasting  continuance 
of  punishment  not  absolute,  but  hypothetical  —  depending  on 
the  question,  "Will  the  sinner  continue  forever  to  sia?"-)- 
Others  have  made  future  punishment  relatively  everlasting ; 
that  is,  because  even  the  repentant  sinner  will  be  always 
just  so  far  behind  the  position  he  would  have  had  if  he  had 
not  sinned.     This,  however,  is  taking  a  material  view  of 

*  The  name  given  to  them  by  Augustine  ("  Civ.  Dei,"  lib.  21,  c.  17) :  "  Denl- 
que  hujus  sententise  Patronos  S.  Augustinus  appellat  titulo  non  incongruo, 
«  Doctores  Misericordes '  tractatque  non  inhumaniter." 

Thomas  Burnet,  "  De  Statu  Mortuum  et  Kesurgentium."    Chap.  XI. 

t  See  Bretschueider, "  Dogmatik,"  and  Strauss,  "  Christlictie  Glaiibenslehre." 


FUTURE  PUNISHMENT.  373 

progress,  as  though  it  was  limited,  like  the  going  of  a  horse, 
to  so  many  miles  a  day. 

Many  of"  the  early  fathers,  and  some  of  the  mediaeval  doc- 
tors, took  milder  views  of  the  futui'e  sufferings  of  the  impen- 
itent or  unconverted.  Proceeding  from  the  idea  of  freedom, 
as  indestructible  in  the  human  soul,  Origeu  declared  that,  no 
matter  how  low  any  moral  being  has  fallen,  a  way  to  return 
is  always  open  to  him.  Even  the  devil  may,  in  time,  re- 
gain the  highest  position  in  the  angelic  hierarchy.*  No 
doubt  Origen  admitted  the  need  of  external  conditions  for 
this  restoration  ;  but  he  said,  God  is  able  to  heal  the  damage 
done  to  any  part  of  his  works.f  He  will  restore  all  things 
to  their  origin,  imiting  the  end  and  the  beginning,  and  so 
becoming  indeed  the  Alpha  and  Omega.  This  may  require 
long  processes,  through  many  ages.  J  Since  .Jesus  speaks 
of  a  sin  which  cannot  be  forgiven  in  this  age  (dtw*')  nor  the 
next,  it  follows,  says  Origen,  that  there  is  a  series  of  ages, 
or  worlds,  through  which  we  pass,  and  many  of  these  ages 
of  ages  (sjecula  steculorum)  must  pass  away  before  all  bad 
men  and  angels  shall  have  returned  to  their  original  state. 
Quoting  the  passage,  "  The  last  enemy  that  shall  be  de- 
stroyed," he  says  that  he  shall  not  be  destroyed  as  to  his 
substance,  but  as  to  his  enmity.  His  being  was  made  by 
God,  and  cannot  perish  ;  his  hostile  will  proceeded  from  him- 
self, and  shall  be  destroyed. 

Mpi  Brownson  (or  rather  a  writer  in  Brownson's  "Quar- 
teily  Review,"  July,  1863)  takes  another  way  of  softening 
the  terrors  of  hell.     With  him  too,  hell  is  an  everlasting 

*  "No9  et  angelos  futures  daemones  si  egerimus  negligenter;  et  rursum 
daemones,  Ei  voluerint  capcre  virtutes,  pervenire  ad  angclieom  dignitatem." 
Origen,  quoted  by  Jerome. 

t  "  Niliil  enim  omnipotenti  impossibile  est,  nee  insanabile  aliquid  est  factorl 

BUG." 

t  "  Quod  tamcn  non  ad  subitum  fieri,  sed  paulatim  et  per  partes  intelligen- 
dum  est,  infinitis  et  immensis  labentibus  sxculis,  cum  scnsim  per  singuios 
emendatio  fuerit  et  correctio  prosecuta,  praecurrentibus  aliis,  aliis  insequenti* 
bus."    See  these  quotations  in  Strauss,  Hase,  &o.' 

32 


374        ,     ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND    ERRORS. 

State ;  but  he  maintains  that  the  Roman  Church  has  not 
made  it  an  article  of  faith  to  believe  that  there  is  any  positive 
suffering  therein.  If  you  believe  in  an  eternal  hell,  that  is 
enough  ;  you  are  not  pi'ecluded  from  softening  its  horrors  to 
any  extent  you  can.  Thus  he  maintains  that  the  great  Au- 
gustine allows  hell  to  be  only  a  negative  state  —  only  the 
absence  of  the  exquisite  beatitude  of  heaven.  This  writer 
(who  is  said  by  the  editor  to  be  a  learned  Catholic  priest) 
asserts  that  there  is  a  growing  repugnance  to  the  popular 
doctrine  upon  eternal  punishment  among  the  most  intelligent 
of  the  Catholic  laity,  and  this  reluctance  is  the  chief  obstacle 
to  the  reception  of  the  faith  by  a  large  class  of  non-Catho- 
lics. He  attempts  to  meet  this  state  of  mind  by  showing 
that  neither  the  doctrine  of  St.  Augustine  nor  that  of  the 
Catholic  Church  supports  this  popular  view,  but  allows  a  much 
milder  one.     He  proceeds  to  make  these  points  :  — 

1.  St.  Augustine  nowhere  teaches  that  human  nature  is 
intrinsically  evil,  but  he  invariably  teaches  that  it  is  substan- 
tially good.  ("  Omnis  natura  in  quantum  natura  est  bona 
est."  "  Omnis  substantia  aut  Deus  est  aut  ex  Deo."  De  Lib. 
Arbit.)  Therefore  it,  follows  that  the  very  notion  of  total 
depravity  is  impossible.  St.  Augustine  distinctly  says  that 
"  the  very  unclean  spirit  himself  is  good,  inasmuch  as  he  is  a 
spirit,  but  evil  inasmuch  as  he  is  unclean."  Hence,  not 
even  the  nature  of  the  devil  himself  is  evil.  So  St.  Thomas 
("  Diabolus,  in  quantum  habet  esse,  est  bonus  "),  "  th^devil, 
so  far  as  he  is,  is  good." 

2.  St.  Augustine  teaches  in  explicit  terms  that  existence 
is  a  good  even  to  angels  and  men  who  are  eternally  bound 
by  the  consequences  of  evil. 

3.  Eternal  death,  according  to  St.  Augustine,  is  a  sub- 
sidence into  a  lower  form  of  life,  a  privation  of  the  highest 
vital  influx  from  God  in  order  to  everlasting  life,  or  supreme 
beatitude,  but  not  of  all  vital  influx  in  order  to  an  endless 
existence,  which  is  a  partial  and  incomplete  participation  in 


FUTURE   PUNISHMENT.  375 

good.  These  sinful  souls,  therefore,  fulfil  in  a  measure  the 
end  of  their  creation,  and  have  a  place  and  a  function  in 
harmony  Avith  the  general  order  of  the  cosmos.  There  is  no 
trace,  in  this  view  of  Augustine,  that  God  hates  a  portion  of 
his  creatures  with  an  absolute,  infinite,  and  eternal  hatred, 
and  is  liated  by  them  in  return.  The  original  act  of  crea- 
tive love  is  an  enduring  and  eternal  act,  in  which  even  Satan 
is  included.  "  Their  nature  still  remains  essentially  good, 
and  far  superior  in  excellence  and  beauty  to  material  light, 
which  is  the  highest  corporeal  substance." 

4.  Hell,  therefore  (Infernus),  is  simply  a  lower  state  of 
inchoate  and  imperfect  being,  "  of  saints  nipped  in  the  bud." 
Infant  damnation  is  only  a  gentle  sadness  —  "  levis  tristitia." 
All  positive  suffering  in  hell  is  probably  temporal,  and  there- 
fore must  at  last  cease.  The  lost  souls  will  enjoy  there 
quite  as  much  as  they  can  do  here,  minus  the  temporal 
sufferings  of  this  life.  They  continue  natural  beings,  and 
therefore  can  enjoy  all  natural  joy  ;  and  that  which  they  lose, 
being  the  "  beatific  vision,"  of  which  they  have  no  concep- 
tion, is  a  loss  of  which  they  are  wholly  unconscious. 

Swedenborg  maintains,  in  the  same  way,  the  everlasting 
character  of  the  punishment  of  those  who  have  passed  the 
final  judgment,  but  admits  many  palliations  to  its  sufferings. 
He  teaches  that  delight  is  the  universal  substance  of  heaven, 
and  also  of  hell,  and  that  evil  spirits  are  in  the  delight  of  evil, 
as  good  spirits  in  that  of  good.  An  evil  spirit  would  be  as 
unhappy  in  heaven  as  a  good  one  would  be  in  hell. 

§  7.  The  meaning  of  Eternal  Punishment  in  Scripture.  — • 
But  what,  then,  is  the  vital  truth  in  the  doctrine  of  eternal 
punishment?  Christ  says,  "These  shall  go  away  into  eter- 
nal punishment."  *     What  is  this  "  eternal  punishment  "  ? 

*  Matt.  25  :  46.  The  Greek  word  translated  in  the  Knglish  as  "  everlasting  " 
punishment  in  the  beginning  of  the  verse,  and  as  life  "  eternal  "  at  the  end,  Is 
the  same  word  (diwi/ioj)  in  both  places,  and  should  be  translated  "  eternal  >»  in 
both. 


376         ,    ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS    AND   ERRORS. 

It  is  commonly  supposed  to  mean  the  same  thing  as  punish- 
ment which  shall  never  end,  or  punishment  continued  through 
all  time.     But  this  is  to  misunderstand  both  the  philosophi- 
cal and  scriptural  meaning  of  the  word  "  eternal."     Eternal 
punishments  are  the  opposite  of  temporal  punishments  :  they 
have  nothing  to  do  with  time  at  all ;  they  are  punishments 
outside  of  time.    To  attempt  to  realize  eternity  by  adding  up 
any  number  of  myriads  of  years  of  time,  is  necessarily  a 
failure ;    for  time   and   eternity  are   different  things.     You 
might  as  well  attempt  to  produce  thought  or  love,  by  adding 
up  millions  of  miles  of  distance,  as,  by  adding  up  millions  of 
years  of  time,  to  get  any  idea  of  eternity.     Eternal  life,  in 
the  language  of  Scripture,  has  nothing  to  do  with  the  future 
or  the  past.     It  is  a  present  life  in  the  souj,  awakened  with- 
in by  the  knowledge  of  God  and  Christ.     "  This  is  life  eter- 
nal, to  know  thee,  the  only  true  God,  and  Jesus  Christ,  whom 
thou  hast  sent."     Eternal  life  and  eternal  death  both  come 
from  the  knowledge  of  God  and  of  Christ.     To  one  it  is  a 
savor  of  life,  to  another  of  death.     Eternal  punishment  and 
eternal  life  are  the  punishments  and  the  rewards  of  eternity, 
distinguished  from  those  of  time,  and  having  their  root  in 
the  knowledge  of  God  which  comes  through  Christ.     Eter- 
nal life  and  eternal  punishment  both  commence  here,  from  the 
judgments  which  takes  place  now :  but  the  last  judgment, 
or  the  judgment  of  the  last  day,  is  that  which  will  take* place 
hereafter,  when  the  soul  shall  have  a  full  knowledge  of  itself 
and  of  God ;  see  its  whole  life  as  it  really  is  ;  have  all  self- 
deceptions  taken  away,  all  disguises  removed,  and  know  it- 
self as  it  is  known.     God's  love,  when  revealed,  attracts  and 
repels.     Like  all  real  force,  it  is  a  polar  force.     The  one 
pole  is  its  attractive  power  over  those  who  are  in  a  truth- 
loving  state ;  the  other  pole  is  its  repelling  power  to  those 
who  are  in  a  truth-hating  state.     Love  attracts  the  truthful, 
and  repels  the  wilful.     Eternal  punishment,  then,  is  the  re- 
pugnance to  God  of  the  soul  which  is  inwardly  selfish  in  its 


FUTURE   PUNISHMENT.  377 

^.jll^ — loving  itself  more  than  truth  and  right.  It  is  the 
sense  of  indignation  and  wrath,  alienation  and  poverty,  which 
rests  on  it  while  in  this  condition.  It  is  the  outer  darkness  ; 
it  is  the  far  country  ;  it  is  the  famine,  which  comes  as  a  holy 
and  blessed  evil,  sent  to  save,  by  bringing  to  repentance,  the 
prodigal  child,  who  has  not  yet  "  come  to  himself." 

From  this  knowledge  of  God  and  of  itself,  therefore, — 
from  this  judgment  of  the  last  day,  —  will  flow  eternal  life 
to  the  one  class,  and  eternal  punishment  or  suflfering  to  the 
other.  Those  who  have  been  conscientious  and  generous ; 
who  have  endeavored  faithfully  to  live  for  truth  and  right ; 
who  have  made  sacrifices,  and  not  boasted  of  them ;  who 
have  clothed  the  naked  and  fed  the  hungry,  making  the  world 
better  and  happier  by  their  presence,  —  will  hear  the  Saviour 
say,  "  Come,  ye  blessed  of  my  Father,  inherit  the  kingdom 
prepared  for  you  from  the  foundation  of  the  Avorld ;  for  I 
was  hungry,  and  ye  gave  me  meat."  Perhaps  they  have 
never  even  heard  the  name  of  Christ ;  perhaps  they  were  the 
Buddhists  of  Burmah,  of  whom  Mr.  Malcom  speaks,  who 
brought  food  to  him,  though  a  stranger  to  them.  "  I  was 
scarcely  seated,"  says  he,  "  when  a  woman  brought  a  nice 
mat  for  me  to  lie  on  ;  another,  cool  water  ;  and  a  man  went 
and  picked  me  a  half  dozen  fine  oranges.  None  sought  or 
expected  the  least  reward,  but  disappeared,  and  left  me  to 
my  repose."  Or  perhaps  they  will  be  the  poor  black  women 
in  Africa,  who  took  such  kind  care  of  Mungo  Park,  singing, 
"  Let  us  pity  the  white  man :  he  has  no  mother  to  bring 
him  milk,  no  wife  to  grind  him  corn."  The  reward  of  their 
fidelity  will  be  the  gift  of  a  greater  power  of  goodness,  com- 
ing from  a  knowledge  of  God  and  Clirist.  They  were  help- 
ing Christ,  though  they  did  not  know  him.  They  will  say, 
"  Lord,  when  saw  we  thee  an  hungered?"  These  Gentiles, 
without  the  law,  who  do  by  nature  the  things  contained  in 
the  law,  will  come  to  know  Christ,  and  receive  a  spiritual 
life  —  life  flowing  from  that  knowledge.  On  the  other  hand, 
32* 


378     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

those  who  have  not  endeavored  to  do  what  they  knew  to 
be  right  will  receive  from  the  same  knowledge  of  God  and 
Christ  a  spiritual  or  eternal  punishment.  Perhaps  they  have 
i-eceived  some  of  it  already  in  this  world  ;  but  a  deeper 
knowledge  of  the  truth  will  bring  a  keener  self-reproach. 
The  worm  that  never  dies  is  this  gnawing  *  tooth  of  con- 
science. The  fire  which  is  not  quenched  is  the  heart  still 
selfish,  turned  to  evil,  joined  with  a  conscience  which  sees 
the  good.  For  man,  as  long  as  he  is  man,  cannot  get  away 
from  himself.  He  may  sophisticate  himself  with  falsehoods, 
put  his  conscience  to  sleep,  and  imagine  that  he  has  escaped 
all  the  penalties  of  evil ;  but  he  cannot  escape  from  himself. 
The  longer  and  deeper  the  sleep  of  conscience,  the  more  ter- 
rible its  final  awakening. 

Eternal  punishment,  therefore,  is  the  punishment  which 
comes  to  man  from  his  spiritual  nature  ;  from  that  side  of 
man  which  connects  him  with  eternity,  in  contradistinction 
from  temporal  punishment,  which  is  that  which  comes  from 
his  temporal  nature  and  the  temporal  wox'ld.  Through  the 
body  he  receives  temporal  pleasure  or  pain  from  the  world 
of  time  and  space ;  through  the  spirit  he  receives  spiritual 
joy  or  sorrow  from  the  world  of  eternity  and  infinity. 

Thus  intimately  are  judgment  and  retribution  connected. 
There  is  nothing  arbitrary  about  rewards  or  punishments. 
They  follow  naturally  and  necessarily  from  the  revelation 
of  divine  and  eternal  truth.  Sooner  or  later,  the  everlasting 
distinctions  between  right  and  wrong,  good  and  evil,  make 
themselves  seen  and  known.  The  distinctions  between  right 
and  wrong  are  eternal. 

The  idea  of  duration  is  not  connected  with  eternal  punish- 
ment or  eternal  life  ;  for  the  idea  of  duration  belongs  to  time, 
and  not  to  eternity.     Human  law  sentences  men,  for  crime, 

*  liemorse—fvom  mordeo,  to  gnaw.  So  St.  Thomas  (Summa,  Pars  III.  2. 
97) :  "  Vermis  non  debet  esse  intelligi  corporalis  sed  spiritualis,  qui  est  con 
ecientiae  remorsus." 


FUTURE  PUNISHMENT.  379 

to  be  punished  by  imprisonment  for  six  months,  three  years, 
ten  years,  or  for  life  ;  but  in  God's  world  there  is  not,  and 
cannot  be,  any  relation  between  a  man's  guilt  and  the  pre- 
cise time  he  is  to  suffer.  He  must  sutfer  while  he  is  guilty, 
be  the  time  longer  or  shorter.  When  he  ceases  to  be  guilty, 
he  must  cease  to  suffer.  He  therefore  lixes  the  duration  of 
bis  suffering  himself:  that  makes  no  part  of  the  divine  sen- 
tence. If  he  judges  himself  unworthy  of  eternal  life  during 
five,  ten,  one  hundred,  or  ten  thousand  million  years,  that  is 
for  himself  to  say.  God  will  never  save  him  against  his 
will ;  and  God  can  wait.  The  sphere  of  time  belongs  to 
man's  freedom ;  that  of  eternity,  to  the  freedom  of  God. 

And  this  reconciles  the  philosophic  difficulty.  Man,  being 
/ree,  can  postpone  his  submission  and  obedience  indefinitely ; 
but,  being  finite,  cannot  postpone  it  infinitely.  At  any  point 
of  time,  he  may  still  resolve  to  resist  the  influx  of  eternal 
life,  and  continue  in  the  sphere  of  death :  but  eternity  sur- 
rounds time,  and  infolds  it ;  and  in  eternity  God's  purposes 
will  be  realized,  and  every  knee  bow,  of  things  in  heaven, 
and  in  earth,  and  under  the  earth.  Universal  harmony  must 
prevail  at  last. 

"Eternal"  and  "everlasting"  are  two  wholly  different 
ideas.  We  fully  believe  in  eternal  punishment,  but  not  in 
everlasting  punishment.  Eternal  life  is  spiritual  life :  eter- 
nal suffering  is  spiritual  suffering. 

The  whole  of  antiquity  recognizes  this  distinction ;  and 
the  Bible  is  saturated  with  it.  When  Jesus  says,  "  He  who 
believes  in  me  has  eternal  life  abiding  in  him,"  there  is 
nothing  about  duration  intended  in  that.  When  he  says, 
"  This  is  life  eternal,  to  know  thee  the  only  true  God,"  there 
is  nothing  about  duration  implied.  It  is  the  quality  of  the 
life  which  is  conveyed  —  spiritual  life,  life  flowing  from  the 
sight  of  God  and  Christ. 

We  believe  in  eternal  punishment ;  but,  because  it  is  eter- 
nal, therefore  it  is  not  everlasting.    Eternal  suffering,  flowing 


380  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS  AND   ERRORS. 

from  the  sight  of  the  eternal  truth  and  love  of  God,  is  real 
suffering,  because  it  involves  the  sight  of  sin,  the  conscious- 
ness of  failure,  the  deep  conviction  of  what  we  ought  to  do 
and  have  not  done ;  but  all  this  leads  to  repentance  and  sal- 
vation. When  the  Lord  turned  and  looked  on  Peter,  Peter 
went  into  eternal  suffering.  He  saw  his  own  guilt  and  the 
infinite  goodness  of  his  Master  at  the  same  time.  The  one 
produced  penitence ;  the  other,  hope.  But,  when  Judas 
hanged  himself,  he  did  not  go  into  eternal  punishment,  but 
into  temporal.  He  saw  his  own  baseness  and  his  own  folly  ; 
but  he  did  not  see  God's  love.  If  he  had  seen  God's  love 
and  Christ's  pardoning  mercy,  together  with  his  sin,  he  would 
not  have  hanged  himself;  but,  like  Peter,  he  would  have  re- 
pented, and  gone  forth  to  preach  the  gospel.   . 

When  we  see  God's  truth  and  love,  we  go  into  eternal  life 
or  into  eternal  suffering,  according  to  the  direction  of  our 
lives  and  hearts.  If  we  are  following  Christ,  and  trying  to 
do  right,  —  if  we  are  not  selfish,  but  generous,  —  then  the 
sight  of  God's  love  and  truth  in  Christ  leads  us  directly  into 
spiritual  joy  ;  but  if  we  are  selfish,  and  seeking  only  our  own 
good,  if  we  are  indifferent  to  the  rights  of  our  fellow-men, 
then  we  go  into  eternal  or  spiritual  suffering. 

The  force  of  eternal  punishment,  therefore,  is  not  in  the 
statement  that  it  is  never  to  end  ;  nor  in  any  description, 
however  vivid,  of  outward  physical  torments.  Such  descrip- 
tions produce  excitement,  agitation,  terror.  But  this  is  not 
conviction.  The  doctrine,  not  being  in  harmony  with  the 
attributes  of  God  or  the  nature  of  man,  can  never  be  sincere- 
ly or  profoundly  believed.  It  is  inwardly  opposed  by  every 
Christian  conviction  in  the  human  soul ;  for  it  is  not  Chris- 
tian, but  Pagan.  It  is  a  relapse  into  Paganism,  an  importa- 
tion of  Pagan  terrors  into  Christianity.  It  degrades  every 
soul  that  teaches  it,  or  that  accepts  it,  in  the  same  way  that 
idolatry  degrades  it.  It  puts  a  veil  between  the  soul  and 
the  true  God. 


FUTURE   PUNISHMENT.  381 

But  the  true  Christian  doctrine  of  eternal  punishment  is, 
that  the  soul  which  sins  shall  eternally  suffer ;  that  there  is 
an  eternal  distinction  between  truth  and  falsehood,  good  and 
evil ;  that  spiritual  distinctions  are  positive  and  real ;  and 
that  evil  is  not  a  mere  negative  thing,  implying  a  little  less 
of  good,  but  positive,  being  the  state  of  a  soul  which  is  re- 
pelled, not  attracted,  by  the  divine  goodness ;  which  keeps 
away  from  God,  as  the  shadow  keeps  on  the  side  of  the  globe 
which  is  away  from  the  sun. 

Again  :  eternal  suffering  is  the  suffering  of  eternity,  as 
distinguished  from  temporal  suffering,  which  has  its  root  in 
time.  This  is  something  which  comes  from  Avithin,  while 
temporal  suffering  comes  from  without.  Till  man  is  recon- 
ciled to  God  by  obedience  and  love,  he  has  the  sentence  of 
death  in  himself.  This  suffering  is  not  arbitrary,  but  fixed 
in  the  nature  of  things.  As  a  sinner,  man  must  be  eternally 
separated  inwardly  from  God,  and  therefore  from  bliss.  His 
hell  is  within  him,  not  without.  And  it  is  also  here,  as  Veil 
as  hereafter,  since  eternity  is  here,  no  less  than  time. 

In  this  view  of  eternal  punishment,  there  is  an  important 
truth  —  truth  essential  to  the  just  spiritual  growth  of  man. 
It  is  needed  to  resist  the  tendency  to  make  light  of  sin.  It 
is  needed  to  oppose  the  view  which  makes  evil,  as  well  as 
good,  a  natural  growth,  and  teaches  that  all  men  are  on 
their  way  upward,  and  will  ultimately  fall  into  heaven  by 
some  specific  levity.  It  is  needed  to  remind  us  that  we 
must  choose  whom  we  will  serve,  and  that,  consciously  or 
unconsciously,  we  are  at  all  moments  tending  either  upward 
or  downward  —  either  towards  God  or  away  from  him. 

This  is  the  great  truth  which  is  often  lost  sight  of  by 
Liberal  Christianity,  and  by  that  easy  optimism  which  de- 
clares that  "  whatever  is,  is  right ;  "  but  darkly  taught,  be- 
cause dimly  seen,  by  Orthodoxy.  Pagan  in  its  form,  there 
is  often  an  essentially  Christian  idea  communicated  by  the 
Orthodox  pulpit.     The  Pagan  form  may  be  neglected  and 


382     ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

disbelieved  :  the  Christian  impression  may  remain.  It  tight- 
ens the  nerves  of  the  soul,  as  a  cold  bath  invigorates  the 
body  made  languid  by  too  much  warmth  and  ease.  Yet,  as 
long  as  the  Pagan  form  remains,  the  interior  truth  is  shorn 
of  its  full  power.  Let  us  pray  that  the  truth,  divested  of  its 
dark  errors,  may  at  last  be  recognized  by  the  Christian 
Church.  For  very  often  the  words  of  a  great  writer  and 
thinker  (who  also  was  an  earnest  opponent  of  the  Orthodox 
form  of  this  doctrine)  recur  to  us  in  these  studies :  "  Few- 
see  the  things  themselves,  but  only  the  forms  of  things,  in 
the  mirror  of  reflection,  as  images.  But  we  shall  at  last  see 
the  things  themselves  face  to  face,  as  it  is  said,  and  without 
a  veil,  if  it  please  God,  in  part  before  the  close  of  this  pres- 
ent life,  more  fully  in  the  life  to  come."  * 

§  8.  How  Judgment  by  Christ  is  connected  luith  Punish- 
ment.—  To  what  we  have  said  of  judgment  by  Christ,  in  the 
previous  chapter,  we  add  here  some  further  thoughts  in  re- 
gard to  its  connection  with  punishment.  Orthodoxy  makes 
this  connection  arbitrary  and  outward.  For  such  sins,  it 
says,  God  has  appointed  such  a  punishment ;  and  the  object 
of  judgment  is  to  glorify  God,  by  showing  how  exact  he  is 
in  finding  out  every  sinner,  and  fulfilling  his  every  threat 
against  evil.  But,  according  to  a  better  view,  which  alone 
can  commend  itself  to  minds  of  any  large  range  —  future 
judgment  is  simply  the  act  by  which  God  shows  to  a  man 
the  truth  concerning  himself,  so  that  he  can  see  it. 

A  deaf  and  dumb  child  being  asked,  "  What  is  judgment?  " 
replied,  "  Judgment  is  to  see  ourselves  as  we  are,  and  to  see 


*  "  Pauci  rea  ipsas,  sed  rerum  imagines,  tanquam  in  speoulo,  intuentur:  at 
res  ipsas,  facie  ad  faciom,  ut  dicitur,  ct  ablato  velo,  visuri  sumus  tandem  si  Deo 
placuerit,  partim  sub  occasu  liujusce  mundi,  plenius  autem  in  future."  —  Thomas 
Burnet,  De  Statu  Mortuorum  et  Kcsurgeutium  Tractatus.  I.ondini.  Typis 
et  impensis  J.  Hooke,  in  vico  vulg6  dicto  Fleet  Street,  1727.  — No  one  lias 
spoken  more  powerfully  and  eloquently  than  he  against  everlasting  punish- 
ment, particularly  in  the  passage  beginning  "Nobis  difficile  est  omnem  exuere 
humanitatem."    p.  309. 


FUTURE   PUNISHMENT.  383 

God  as  be  is."  This  is  the  essential  thing  in  judgment ;  and 
in  this  sense  Christ  is  dechxred  "  to  be  the  judge  of  the  quick 
and  tlie  dead  ; "  that  is,  he  judges  us  in  this  world,  and  will 
judge  us  in  the  other  world.  His  judgments  arc  not  exter- 
nal, sentencing  us  to  external  punishments  ;  but  they  arc  in- 
ternal, causing  us  to  judge  ourselves.  He  shows  us  what  we 
are.  Whenever  he  comes,  he  comes  to  judgment,  separat- 
ing the  good  from  the  evil,  testing  the  state  of  the  heart, 
causing  men  to  go  to  the  right  or  the  left.  His  coming 
always  makes  an  issue  which  cannot  be  avoided ;  calls  upon 
us  lo  decide  which  course  we  shall  take,  what  thing  we  shall 
do,  what  master  we  will  serve.  When  Christ  first  came,  he 
came  for  judgment,  that  the  thoughts  of  many  hearts  might 
be  revealed,  —  revealed  to  themselves  and  to  others.  Wher- 
ever he  came,  men  immediately  were  divided  into  two  classes, 
—  becoming  his  disciples,  or  becoming  his  opponents.  No 
longer  was  any  compromise  possible  between  truth  and  error, 
between  right  and  wrong.  Tiiey  were  obliged  to  choose 
Avhich  to  serve  ;  and  they  chose  according  to  the  inward 
tendency  of  their  hearts.  They  whose  hearts  were  right, 
chose  the  right :  they  whose  hearts  were  wrong,  chose  the 
wrong. 

Christ  is  thus  the  Judge  of  the  living  as  well  as  the  dead. 
Often  in  our  lives  he  comes  to  us  thus  to  be  our  Judge. 
Every  time  he  calls  upon  us  to  do  anything  for  him,  he  judges 
the  state  of  our  heart.  Every  time  he  offers  an  opportunity 
to  the  world  of  improvement  or  progress,  he  judges  the 
world. 

When  he  was  on  trial  before  Caiaphas  and  before  Pilate, 
they  were  on  trial,  and  not  he.  When  they  sentenced  him, 
they  condemned  themselves.  During  the  Avhole  of  those 
dark  hours,  when  Christ  was  buffeted,  spit  upon,  crowned 
with  thorns,  to  the  eyes  of  angels  he  was  seen  to  be  sittin" 
on  the  throne  of  his  glory.  Caiaphas  and  the  Jewish  priests, 
Pontius  Pilate  and  the  Roman  soldiers,  Judas  Iscariot,  the 


384         orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

Jewish  people,  each  in  turn  received  their  sentence,  and 
passed  to  the  left  hand.  And  so  ever  since,  whenever  any- 
great  opportunity  has  been  given  to  the  world  to  decide  be- 
tween right  and  wrong,  the  world  has  pronounced  judgment 
on  itself;  has  gone  to  the  right  hand  with  the  sheep,  or  to 
the  left  hand  with  the  goats.  When  Paul  offered  Christian- 
ity to  the  Jews,  and  they  rejected  it,  he  said  "  it  was  neces- 
sai'y  that  the  word  of  God  should  first  have  been  spoken  to 
you ;  but  seeing  you  put  it  from  you,  and  judge  yourselves 
unworthy  of  eternal  life,  lo,  we  turn  to  the  Gentiles."  So 
it  always  is.  God  does  not  judge  us,  nor  Christ;  but  we 
judge  ourselves.  For  this  reason  Jesus  says,  "  If  any  man 
hear  me,  and  believe  not,  I  judge  him  not ;  for  I  came  not 
to  judge  the  world."  And  again  he  says,  "  The  word  which 
I  have  spoken,  the  same  shall  judge  him  at  the  last  day." 
And  yet  again,  "  This  is  the  judgment,  that  light  has  come 
into  the  world,  and  that  men  have  chosen  darkness  rather 
than  light,  because  their  deeds  are  evil." 

The  account  of  judgment  (in  the  25th  chapter  of  Matthew) 
at  Christ's  coming  we  considered  in  the  last  chapter.  It 
will,  however,  bear  a  little  further  examination.  There  are 
Jiree  different  judgments  indicated  in  the  three  parables  of 
the  virgins,  the  talents,  and  the  sheep  and  goats.  The  first 
is  the  judgment  of  opportunity,  the  second  of  work,  the  third 
of  knowledge.  In  the  first  and  second  we  judge  ourselves, 
in  the  last  we  are  judged.  These  two  occur  in  time,  the  other 
in  eternity.  The  first  two  are  the  judgments  which  take  place 
at  Christ's  coming  here  ;  the  thii-d  is  the  judgment  of  "  the 
last  day."  The  first  takes  place  whenever  we  are  "  called  " 
by  a  new  opportunity  ;  the  second  comes  in  all  retribution  ; 
the  third  by  the  inward  revelation  of  God's  truth,  showing 
men  what  they  are,  and  what  God  is.  The  wise  and  foolish 
virgins  represent  those  who  are  invited  to  receive  Christianity  ; 
the  servants  with  the  talents,  believers  who  have  received  it 


FUTURE   PUNISHMENT.  385 

in  different  degrees  ;  and  the  nations  (heathen,  rd  W^•tj)  * 
those  (in  Christendom  or  outside  of  it)  to  whom  Christianity- 
has  never  come. 

§  9.  The  Doctrine  of  Annihilation. — This  view  of  the 
final  results  of  moral  evil,  as  destroying  personal  existence, 
is  hardly  an  Orthodox  doctrine,  though  quasi-Orthodox.  It 
\b  the  refuge  of  that  class  of  minds  which  are  unable  to  ac- 
cepl  universal  restoration  on  the  one  side,  or  everlasting  pun- 
ishment on  the  other.  To  them  a  large  number  of  human 
beings  seem  "  too  good  for  banning,  and  too  bad  for  bless- 
ing," and  in  their  opinion  will  be  suffered  quietly  to  drop  out 
of  conscious  existence.  The  analogies  of  nature,  in  which 
out  of  many  seeds  and  many  eggs  produced,  only  a  few  attain 
to  the  condition  of  plants  and  animals,  tend  to  confirm  this 
view.  The  state  of  human  character  here  appears  also  to 
favor  it,  since  multitudes  pass  out  of  this  world  in  an  unde- 
veloped condition,  seeming  wholly  to  have  failed  of  the  end 
of  their  being.  The  chief  scriptural  argument  in  favor  of 
the  doctrine  is  found  in  the  assumption  that  "  life  through 
Christ"  is  equivalent  to  continued  conscious  existence,  and 


*  Is  it  not  remarkable  (as  showinfj  how  little  the  New  Testament  has  as  yet 
been  really  studied)  that  there  should  be  so  many  discussions  as  to  the  future 
doom  of  the  heathen,  when  Jesus  himself  here  distinctly  tells  us  what  it  will  be. 
The  word  iOi/n  is  the  only  word  in  the  New  Testament  which  is  ever  translated 
heathen:  wherever  the  word  heathen  occurs  in  our  Bible,  it  is  always  this. 
Jesus  teaches  that  the  heathen  (inside  and  outside  of  Christendom)  will  be 
judged  according  to  their  humanity,  their  obedience  to  the  law  written  in  their 
hearts;  and  he  shows  that  this  is  coincident  witli  the  law  of  Christianity.  So, 
•when  the  Church  of  England  says  (in  its  18th  article)  that  "  they  also  arc  to 
be  had  accursed  that  presume  to  say  that  every  man  shall  be  saved  by  the  law 
or  sect  he  professeth,  so  that  he  be  diligent  to  frame  his  life  according  to  that 
liw  and  the  light  of  nature;"'  it  denounces  this  curse  on  Christ  himself,  and 
thus  proves  conclusively  that  it  is  not  speaking  by  the  Spirit  of  (jod,  since 
"no  man,  speaking  by  the  Spirit  of  God,  calleth  Jesus  accursed."  (1  Cor.l2:.3.) 
This  comes  of  the  habit  (happily  less  common  now  than  formerly)  of  tlirowing 
about  curses  at  random,  against  those  who  diflcr  from  our  opinions.  Some  of 
them  may  thus,  accidentally,  hit  the  IMaster  himself.  It  is,  perhaps,  of  less 
consequence  that  this  anathema  also  touches  the  apostle  Paul,  who  declares  that 
the  Iieathen  who  have  not  the  law  arc  a  law  to  themselves  when  they  do 
right,  and  are  absolved  by  their  conscience.    ( Rom.  2 :  14.) 

33 


386     ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

that  "  death  "  as  the  punishment  of  sin,  is  equivalent  to  an- 
nihilation. We  have  so  fully  discussed  the  meaning  of  these 
terms  in  the  previous  chapter,  that  it  is  not  desirable  to  argue 
this  point  here.  We  agree  with  the  Orthodox  view,  and  dif- 
fer from  that  of  the  annihilationists  on  this  point.  The  God 
of  the  gospel  is  the  Father  of  all  his  children  —  of  the  weakest, 
feeblest,  and  most  sinful.  If  he  is  the  God  of  all,  then  he  is 
"  the  God,  not  of  the  dead,  but  of  the  living,  for  all  live  to 
him."  Indian  tribes  and  heathen  nations  may  be  willing 
that  the  sickly  infants,  and  those  worn  with  age,  should 
perish  ;  they  may  expose  female  infants,  thinking  them  not 
worth  bringing  up  ;  but  Christian  nations  establish  schools 
and  hospitals  for  the  deaf  and  dumb,  the  insane,  the  in- 
ebriates, the  idiotic.  If  we,  then,  being  evil,  know  how  to 
care  for  the  weak,  undeveloped,  and  vegetative  natures,  how 
much  more  shall  their  Father  in  heaven  care  for  them  !  The 
doctrine  of  annihilation  rests  fundamentally  on  a  Pagan  view 
of  God. 

§  10.  The  Doctrine  of  Universal  Restoration.  —  This  opin- 
ion has  its  roots,  we  think,  in  the  gospel.  It  has  prevailed 
in  the  church  from  the  earliest  times,  having  been  held,  as 
we  have  seen,  by  Origen,  and  a  great  number  of  eminent 
church  fathers  and  doctors.  What  more  Christian  word  has 
come  to  us  from  the  earliest  centuries  than  the  cry  out  of  the 
heart  of  the  great  Alexandrian  teacher,  "  My  Saviour,  even 
now,  mourns  for  my  sins.  My  Saviour  cannot  be  happy 
while  I  remain  in  my  iniquity.  He  does  not  wish  to  drink 
the  cup  of  joy  alone  in  the  kingdom  of  God ;  he  is  waiting 
till  we  shall  come  and  join  him  there."  * 

Our  object  in  this  chapter  is  to  consider  the  Orthodox 
view,  and  we  shall  not,  therefore,  enter  into  any  extensive 
argument  concerning  universal  salvation.     We  will  only  here 

*  Origen,  Homil.  in  Levit.  7:2.  "  Salvator  meus  luget  etiatn  nunc  peccata 
mea;  Salvator  meus  laetari  non  potest,  donee  ego  in  iniquitate  permaneo, 
Non  vult  Bolus  in  regno  Dei  bibere  vinum  laetitiae  —  nos  expectat." 


FUTURE  PUNISHMENT.  387 

indicate  the  general  scriptural  evidence  in  its  support.  Tho 
alternative  to  tlie  Orthodox  view  of  everlasting  punishment 
is  not,  as  we  have  shown,  necessarily  Universalism.  It  may 
be  annihilation,  or  it  may  be,  under  the  name  of  eternal  pun- 
ishment, a  negative  evil,  being  the  privation  of  the  highest 
kind  of  happiness.  Still,  it  seems  proper  to  suggest,  if  only 
very  briefly,  some  reasons  given  by  Universalists  for  their 
belief. 

In  the  Epistles  of  Paul  there  are  five  or  six  passages, 
which  appear  to  teach,  or  to  imply,  an  ultimate  restoration 
of  salvation  of  all  moral  beings.     Among  them  are  these  :  — 

1.  Eph.  1  : 9,  10.  "Having  made  known  to  us  the  mys- 
tery of  his  will,  according  to  his  good  pleasure,  which  he 
hath  purposed  in  himself,  that  in  the  dispensation  of  the 
fulness  of  times  he  might  gather  together  in  one  all  things 
in  Christ,  both  which  are  in  heaven  and  which  are  on  earth, 
even  in  him." 

The  apostle  is  speaking  of  the  "  riches  of  God's  grace," 
wherein  "  he  hath  abounded  toward  us,"  and  gives  as  the 
proof  this  revelation  made  in  Christ  of  a  great  mystery  — 
that  "  in  the  dispensation  [economy]  of  the  fulness  of  times" 
he  might  bring  into  one  (under  one  head)  "  all  things  in 
heaven  and  on  earth."  The  idea  of  the  passage  seems  evi- 
dently to  be  that  in  the  economy,  or  order,  of  the  divine 
plan,  which  extends  through  indefinite  periods  of  time,  all 
things  shall  be  united  under  one  head  in  Christ.  But  if  • 
brought  under  one  head  (as  the  Greek  word  signifies),  then 
all  become  Christians,  all  "in  heaven  and  earth."  This 
would  seem  to  be  a  very  plain  statement  of  a  universal  res- 
toration. 

As  such,  Olshausen,  one  of  the  most  Orthodox  of  commen- 
tators, regards  it.  He  rejects  all  the  explanations  offered  by 
the  advocates  of  everlasting  punishment  as  unsatisfactory. 
"  It  cannot  be  disputed,"  he  says,  "  that  in  it  the  restoration 
of  all  things  seems  to  be  again  favored  —  a  view  which  Paul 


888     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

in  general,  as  has  already  been  remarked  (on  Rom.  11  :  32  ; 
1  Cor.  15  :  24  ;  Gal.  3  :  22)  says  more  to  support  than  the 
other  writers  of  the  New  Testament."  Olshausen  declares 
the  interpretations  which  suppose  a  merely  external  subjec- 
tion of  the  world  to  Christ  to  be  entirely  inadequate,  and  have 
left  unresolved  the  principal  difficulty,  which  is,  "  how  Paul 
could  say  that  all  have  a  share  in  redemption,  if  he  held  the 
common  view  that  the  numberless  hosts  of  angels  who  fell, 
along  with  the  far  greatest  part  of  mankind  (Matt,  7 :  13, 
14)  are  eternally  damned,  and  thus  shut  out  from  the  har- 
mony of  the  universe.  The  defenders  of  universal  restora- 
tion, says  Olshausen,  "  understand  the  harmony  of  the 
universe  seriously,  in  its  literal  meaning,  and  seem,  accord- 
ing to  that,  to  be  here  in  the  right." 

2.  Phil.  2  :  9,  10.  "  Wherefore  God  hath  highly  exalted 
him,  and  given  him  a  name  which  is  above  every  name, 
that  at  the  name  of  Jesus  every  knee  should  bow,  of  things 
in  heaven,  and  things  on  earth,  and  things  under  the  earth, 
and  that  every  tongue  should  confess  that  Jesus  Christ  is  Lord, 
to  the  glory  of  God  the  Father."  Here  we  have  "  things  un- 
der the  earth"  (^xaiuydoviMi'^  added  to  "  things  in  heaven  and 
on  earth."  This  word  only  occurs  here  in  the  New  Testa- 
ment, but  is  by  Bretschneider  (Lex.  Man.)  translated  "  sub- 
terranean" or  "  infernal,"  and  applied  to  the  inhabitants  of 
Hades,  with  a  reference  to  Origen,  who  uses  the  word  in 
relation  to  the  demons.  De  Wette  applies  the  language  to 
angels,  living  men,  and  the  dead.  At  all  events,  it  appears 
to  include  all  moral  beings,  and  to  declare  that  the  whole 
human  race  shall  bow  to  Christ,  and  accept  him  as  Master. 
But  this  cannot  mean  a  merely  outward  submission,  for  such 
a  forced  and  reluctant  homage  would  bring  little  honor  to 
God,  nor  be  worth  such  adiniration  on  the  part  of  the  apos- 
tle. It  must  therefore  mean  that  all  men,  not  only  all  who 
now  live,  but  all  who  have  lived,  shall  finally  become  Chris- 
tians and  enter  into  the  glory  of  God. 


FUTURE   PUNISHMENT.  389 

3.  Col.  1  :  20.  "  And,  having  made  peace  by  the  blood 
of  the  cross,  by  him  to  I'cconcile  all  things  to  himself;  by 
him,  I  say,  whether  they  be  things  in  earth  or  things  in 
heav'en."  Here  a  new  feature  is  added  to  the  statement  by 
the  word  "reconcile,"  which  evidently  expresses  the  entire 
conversion  of  the  heart,  and  therefore  of  human  beings,  to 
the  law  of  Christ. 

4.  1  Cor.  15  :  22.  "  As  in  Adam  all  die,  even  so  in 
Christ  shall  all  be  made  alive."  The  "  all  "  must  be  as  ex- 
tensive on  one  side  as  the  other.  Now,  whether  the  death 
in  Adam  be  physical  or  moral,  whether  it  mean  the  dissolu- 
tion of  the  earthly  body,  or  the  loss  of  innocence  by  sin,  it 
certainly  includes  all  human  beings,  in  the  fullest  sense.  All 
men  die,  and  all  men  sin.  It  would  therefore  seem  that  the 
other  "  all "  must  be  quite  as  comprehensive.  It  must  include 
all  human  beings.  All  men  shall  "  be  made  alive  in  Christ." 
But  this  cannot  mean  a  mere  physical  immortality,  or  an 
immortality  in  misery ;  for  one  cannot  be  said  to  be  "  alive 
in  Christ"  who  is  suffei-ing  endless  torment.  To  be  "  alive 
in  Christ"  means  to  be  spiritually  alive,  for  "  lie  that  hath 
the  Son  hath  life." 

5.  1  Cor.  24 :  28.  In  this  passage  Paul  declares  that  all 
enemies  shall  be  subject  to  Christ.  But  this,  again,  cannot 
mean  a  forced  submission,  for  that  is  in  no  sense  being  sub- 
ject to  Christ.  Christ's  subjects  are  willing  subjects.  It 
therefore  must  mean  that,  finally,  all  human  beings  shall  be- 
come Christian  in  conviction  and  in  heart. 

These  five  texts  from  the  apostle  Paul  seem  to  us  very 
plain  and  conclusive  as  to  his  opinions.  But  perhaps  the 
strongest  evidence  in  proof  of  a  universal  restoration  is  to  be 
found  in  Christ's  own  parable  of  the  prodigal  son.  For  iu 
this  the  genuine  spirit  and  pui'pose  of  the  gospel  is  shown  to 
be  that  God  never  loses  his  fatherly  love  ibr  his  rebellious  and 
lost  children.  On  the  contrary,  his  heart  yearns  towards 
them  with  a  more  earnest  affection  than  towards  the  holy  and 
33* 


890  ORTHODOXY  :    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

good.  The  prodigal  son  represents  those  who  are  "  dead  in 
sin."  (Luke  15  :  24-32.)  The  parable  teaches  that  God  loves 
them  all  the  while  they  are  away,  and  that  "  there  is  more 
joy  in  heaven  over  one  sinner  that  repenteth  than  over  ninety 
and  nine  just  persons  who  need  no  repentance."  Now,  if 
God  loves  the  sinners  thus  whose  bodies  are  yet  alive,  does 
he  cease  to  love  them  when  the  bodily  change  takes  place 
which  we  call  death  ?  Does  his  nature  change  then  ?  And 
if  not,  does  it  ever  change  ?  After  millions  of  years,  if  they 
have  been  lost  and  dead  so  long,  has  his  love  become  weary 
of  waiting,  or  does  "his  mercy  endure  forever"? 

To  us  it  seems  clear,  that  if  the  parable  of  the  prodigal 
son  is  to  be  taken  as  a  true  statement  of  the  feeling  of  God 
towards  every  sinner,  that  every  sinner  must  at  last  be 
brought  back  by  the  mighty  power  of  this  redeeming  love. 
The  power  of  the  human  will  to  resist  God  is  indeed  indefi- 
nite ;  but  the  power  of  love  is  infinite.  Sooner  or  later,  then, 
in  the  economy  of  the  ages,  all  sinners  must  come  back,  in 
penitence  and  shame,  to  their  Father's  house,  saying,  "  Make 
us  as  thy  hired  servants."  If  so,  if  universal  restoration  does 
not  mean  primarily  restoration  to  outward  happiness,  but  to 
inward  obedience,  it  seems  to  us  that  the  doctrine  may  be  so 
stated  as  to  be  a  new  motive  for  presejit  repentance  and  obedi- 
ence. May  we  not  say  to  the  sinner.  You  may  resist  God 
to-day,  to-morrow,  for  a  million  years ;  but,  sooner  or  later, 
you  must  return,  obey,  repent,  and  submit?  God  will 
spare  no  means  to  bring  you.  His  love  to  you  requires  him 
to  use  all  methods,  all  terrors,  all  suffering.  The  "  worm 
that  never  dies,"  the  "  fire  that  is  never  quenched,"  the 
"  outer  darkness,"  —  these  are  all  blessed  means,  in  the  provi- 
dence of  the  Almighty,  to  bring  the  sinner  back  to  a  sense  of 
his  evil  state.  In  the  other  world,  as  in  this  world,  God 
will  "  chasten  us,  not  for  his  pleasure,  but  for  our  profit, 
that  we  may  be  partakers  of  his  holiness." 


THE  CHRISTIAN   CHURCH.  891 


CHAPTER    XV. 

THE   CHRISTIAN   CHURCH. 

§  1.  The  Question  stated.  —  One  of  the  most  interesting 
questions  of  the  present  time,  in  practical  theology,  concerns 
the  nature,  authority,  organization,  functions,  and  future  of 
the  Christian  Church.  The  interest  in  this  subject  has  re- 
cently much  revived,  in  consequence  of  a  reaction  towards 
the  Roman  Catholic  or  High  Church  view.  This  has  ap- 
peared in  the  tendency  among  Protestants  to  join  the  Cath- 
olic Church  as  the  only  true  and  saving  Church  of  Christ. 
The  same  tendency  has  taken  into  the  Church  of  England, 
and  into  the  Episcopal  Church  of  the  United  States,  those 
Avho  were  not  ready  to  go  as  far  as  Rome.  It  is  therefore 
important  and  useful  to  ask.  What  is  the  truth  and  what  the 
error  in  the  different  views  concerning  the  Church  ?  These 
differ  very  widely.  The  Roman  Catholics  declare  thai  theirs 
is  the  only  true  Church,  and  that  out  of  it  is  no  salvation. 
Many  Protestants  reply  that  the  Roman  Catholic  Church 
is  Antichrist,  and  the  only  true  Churches  are  those  which 
hold  the  Evangelical  or  Orthodox  creed.  The  Swedeubor- 
gians  say  that  the  Old  Church  came  to  an  end  in  1758,  and 
that  since  then  the  New  Church  has  taken  its  place.  Final- 
ly, a  considerable  number  of  persons  maintain  that  all  these 
churches  are  worse  than  useless,  and  that  it  is  the  duty  of 
Christians  to  come  out,  and  be  separate  from  them  all. 
They  do  not  believe  in  the  need  of  any  church,  but  would 
substitute  for  it  societies  for  special  purposes,  —  lyceums  and 
literary  clubs  for  purposes  of  mental  instruction  ;  temperance 
societies,  peace  societies,  and  other  associations  for  moral 


892    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

purposes  ;  and  Odd-Fellows  associations,  Masonic  associa- 
tions, and  clubs  for  social  purposes. 

The  question  then  is,  Is  a  Christian  Church  needed  for  the 
permanent  wants  of  man  ?  Was  such  a  Church  established 
by  Christ?  If  so,  which  Church  is  it?  And  what  is  to  be 
its  future  character  and  mode  of  organization  ? 

It  is  scarcely  necessary  to  discuss  here  the  abstract  ques- 
tion—  Is  a  church  an  essential  want  of  man,  so  as  to  be 
needed  by  him  forever?  It  is  enough  to  show  that  a  church 
is  needed  now,  and  will  be,  for  a  long  time  to  come.  Every 
religion  has  had  its  church.  No  sooner  does  a  new  idea 
arise,  than  it  is  incorporated  in  some  outward  union.  The 
new  wine  is  put  into  new  bottles.  Confucius  has  his  church, 
Mohammed  has  his  church  ;  even  Mormonism  and  Spiritualism 
have  established  their  churches.  The  Christian  Church  arose 
immediately  after  the  ascension  of  Jesus ;  it  came  as  a  mat- 
ter of  necessity,  born  not  of  flesh,  nor  of  the  will  of  man,  but 
of  God.  It  has  continued  ever  since,  in  ever-varying  forms, 
but  one  undying  body.  Other  institutions  have  risen  and 
passed  away.  The  Roman  empire  has  disappeared.  The 
barbarous  nations  overflowed  Europe,  and  then  were  civil- 
ized. Christianized,  and  absorbed  into  the  Christian  Church. 
Protestantism  separated  from  Romanism,  but  the  Church  re- 
mained in  both.  Other  sects,  Presbyterian,  Independent-, 
Quaker,  Methodist,  Baptist,  Swedenborgian,  Unitarian,  Uni- 
versalist,  separated  from  the  main  Protestant  body,  but  each 
took  with  it  the  church ;  each  has  its  own  church.  Even 
the  Quakers,  the  most  unchurched  apparently  of  any,  who 
renounced  the  visible  ministry,  and  the  visible  sacraments, 
made  themselves  presently  into  the  most  compact  church  of 
all.  So  the  word  continues  evermore  to  be  made  flesh.  So 
all  spirit  presently  becomes  incarnate  in  body.  The  body  is 
outward  and  visible  ;  the  spirit  inward  and  invisible.  Both 
are  necessary  to  the  life,  growth,  and  active  influence  of  the 
gospel.     Without  the  spirit  of  Christianity,  the  body  would 


THE    CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  893 

be  good  for  nothing ;  it  would  be  only  a  corpse.  Without 
the  body  of  Christiivnity,  the  spirit  would  be  comparatively 
inactive  ;  it  would  be  only  a  ghost.  A  body  without  spirit 
corrupts  and  is  offensive  ;  a  spirit  without  body  is  inopera- 
tive and  alarming.  Through  body  alone  the  spirit  can  act ; 
through  spirit  alone  the  body  can  live. 

"Without  asking,  therefore,  for  any  other  authority  for  the 
Church,  than  its  adaptation  to  human  wants,  we  may  safely 
say,  that  it  is  a  great  mistake  to  suppose  we  can  dispense 
■with  churches.  You  cannot  overthrow  the  churches,  not  the 
weakest  of  them,  by  any  agency  you  can  use  ;  for  all  came 
up  to  meet  and  supply  a  Avant  of  the  human  soul.  They  are 
built  on  that  rock.  What  will  you  put  in  their  place  ?  A  ly- 
ceum?  A  debating  society?  A  reform  club?  What  are  you 
to  say  to  the  souls  of  men,  hungering  and  thirsting  for  God? 
What  to  the  sinner,  borne  down  by  the  mighty  weight  of 
transgression  ?  AYhat  to  the  dying  man,  who  knows  not  how 
to  prepare  to  meet  his  God?  We  need  the  Church  of  Christ 
—  the  Church  whose  great  aim  it  is,  and  always  has  been,  to 
renew  and  regenerate  the  soul  from  its  foundation,  to  lay  the 
axe  at  the  root  of  the  tree  of  evil,  and  the  very  sound  of  v/hose 
bell,  rolling  its  waves  of  music  over  the  sleeping  hills  on  the 
Sabbath  morning,  is  worth  more  to  the  soul  than  a  thousand 
lyceums  and  debating  societies. 

No  ;  the  Church  is  not  to  be  destroyed  ;  it  is  to  be  renewed 
with  a  deeper  and  fuller  life.  We  want  a  better  Church,  no 
doubt  —  one  more  free  in  its  thought,  more  active  in  its  char- 
ity, with  more  of  brotherhood  in  it.  We  want  an  apostolic 
Church,  fitted  to  the  needs  of  the  nineteenth  century.  The 
theological  preaching  which  satisfied  our  parents  is  not  what 
we  w-ish  now.  We  need  Christianity  applied  to  life  —  the 
life  of  the  individual  and  of  the  state.  A  better  Church,  no 
doubt,  is  needed ;  but  we  want  the  churches  fulfilled.^  not  de- 
stroyed. 

§  2.    Orthodox  Doctrine  of  the  Church  —  Roman  Catholic 


394     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

and  High  Church.  —  Admitting,  then,  the  permanency  of  the 
Christian  Church,  we  next  ask,  "What  is  its  true  form?"  or, 
"  Which  is  the  true  Church  ?  "  or,  again,  to  state  it  in  another 
way,  "  Is  the  form  of  the  Church  permanent,  or  only  its  sub- 
stance?. Is  any  union  for  Christian  purposes,  for  worship 
and  work,  a  Church,  or  must  it  be  found  in  some  particular 
organic  form?"  To  this  question  Romanism  and  High 
(Church  Episcopacy  reply,  "It  must."  The  rest  of  Prot- 
estantism answers,  "No."  Romanism  says  —  Jesus  es- 
tablished an  essential  form  for  his  Church,  as  well  as  au 
essential  substance.  The  true  Church  is  an  organization  as 
well  defined  as  any  corporation  for  secular  purposes.  It  has 
the  monopoly  of  saving  souls,  a  patent  right  of  communicat- 
ing spiritual  life,  which  cannot  lawfully  be  infringed  by  any 
other  corporation.  This  right  was  originally  bestowed  on 
St.  Peter,  and  has  been  transmitted  by  him  to  his  successors, 
bishops  of  Rome.  The  proof  is  in  the  original  deed  of  gift, 
"  Thou  art  Peter,"  &c.,  and  in  the  regularity  of  the  succes- 
sion of  subsequent  bishops. 

"  According  to  the  Catholic  dogma,"  says  Guericke,*  "  the 
Church  is  an  outward  community,  by  which  all  communion 
with  Christ  is  conditioned  and  mediated.  This  outward 
community  is  the  true  Church,  with  the  signs  of  vinity,  uni- 
versality, apostolicity,  and  holiness,  and  is  both  the  only  in- 
fallible Church,  and  only  one  which  can  save  the  soul." 
This  Church,  according  to  Bellarmine,  is  a  wholly  visible  and 
outward  association  ;  as  much  so  as  the  kingdom  of  France 
or  republic  of  Venice.!  According  to  Moehler,  J  the  Church 
"  is  the  visible  community  of  believers,  founded  by  Christ, 
in  which,  by  means  of  an  enduring  apostleship,  &c.,  the 
works  wrought  by  him  during  his  earthly  life  are  continued 

*  Guericke,  Christ.  Symbolik,  §  70. 

t  Ecclesia  enim  est  coetus  homiaum  ita  visibilis  et  palpabilis  ut  est  coetua 
populi  Romani,  vel  regnum  Gallise,  aut  respublica  Venetorum."  Bellarmin, 
Eccles.  Milit.  c.  2. 

X  Moehler.  Symbolism,  §  36. 


THE   CHRISTIAN   CHURCH.  395 

to  the  end  of  the  world."  The  Roman  Catholic  idea  is  of  a 
visible  Church  only,  and  not  of  a  Church  at  once  visible  and 
invisible,  which  is  the  Protestant  notion.  It  is  composed  of 
good  and  bad,  while  the  Protestant  notion  makes  the  true 
Church  consist  only  of  the  regenerate.* 

The  chief  refutation  of  this  claim  of  the  Romish  Church  is 
to  be  found  in  the  very  vastness  of  its  assumption.  Assum- 
ing itself  to  be  the  only  true  Church,  and  the  only  one  founded 
by  Christ,  we  of  course  require  full  and  exact  evidence  iu 
proof  of  its  assertion.  It  must  prove,  (1.)  That  Jesus 
founded  an  outward  Church  of  this  kind  ;  (2.)  That  he  made 
Peter  its  head ;  (3.)  That  he  gave  Peter  power  to  continue 
his  authority  to  his  successors ;  (4.)  That  the  bishops  of 
Rome  are  the  successors  of  Peter ;  (5.)  That  this  succession 
has  been  perfect  and  uninterrupted  ;  (6.)  That  the  Roman 
Catholic  Church  is  infallible,  and  has  never  committed  any 
mistake;  (7.)  That  it  is  Catholic,  and  includes  all  true 
Christians ;  (8.)  That  it  is  at  one  with  itself,  having  never 
known  divisions  ;  (9.)  That  it  is  the  only  holy  Church,  bear- 
ing the  fruits  of  Christian  chai'acter  in  a  quality  and  quantity 
which  no  other  Church  can  rival.  If  any  one  of  these  nine 
propositions  fail,  the  whole  claim  of  Rome  falls  pi'ostrate. 
But  they  all  fail,  not  one  being  susceptible  of  proof.  It  can- 
not be  made  to  appear  that  Jesus  ever  intended  to  found  a 
Church  having  such  a  monopoly  of  salvation  ;  nor  that  the 
apostle  Peter  was  ever  placed  at  its  head,  with  supreme  au- 
thority ;  f  nor,  if  he  had  this  authority,  that  he  ever  was 
bishop  of  Rome  ;  nor,  if  he  were,  that  he  ti'ansmitted  his 
authority  to  his  successors ;  nor,  if  he  did,  that  the  bishops 
of  Rome  are  his  successors  ;  nor,  if  they  are,  that  the  succes- 

*  "  Bonos  et  malos  ad  ecclesiam  pertinere  Catholica  fides  verc  et  constaatcy 
affirmat."    Cat.  Rom. 

t  The  chief  passage  in  proof  of  this,  as  is  well  known,  is  Matt.  10: 18, 19 
"  Thou  art  Peter,"  &c.    Cut  even  Aug-ustine,  the  great  light  of  the  Latif 
Church,  says  that  "  Peter  was  not  the  Rock,  but  Christ  was  the  Rock. 
(Neander,  vol.  ii.  p.  168.)    The  same  power  was  given  to  the  other  apostles. 
Matt,  lb  :  16.    John  20 :  23.     Rev.  21 :  14. 


396         orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

sion  has  been  unbroken  ;  nor  that  the  church  has  been  actu- 
ally infallible ;  nor  that  it  includes  all  true  Christians ;  nor 
that  it  has  been  free  from  schisms  ;  nor  that  it  has  always 
been  so  pure  and  holy  as  to  show  that  Romanism  is  emi- 
nently Christian,  and  Protestantism  not  so.  The  chain  of 
proof,  therefore,  which,  if  one  link  parted,  would  be  a  broken 
chain,  is  broken  at  every  link,  and  cannot  carry  conviction 
to  any  unbiassed  mind. 

In  a  little  work  lately  published  in  France  by  the  Protes- 
tant Pastor,  Mr.  Bost,*  the  author  gives  as  a  reason  for  not 
being  a  Catholic,  that  while  the  Church  calls  on  us  to  sub- 
mit to  its  authority,  it  cannot  tell  where  the  authority  resides.| 
The  Ultramontanes  place  it  in  the  person  of  the  pope  ;  but 
the  Galileans  have  never  admitted  this  idea,  and  place  the 
supreme  authority  in  a  universal  council. 

Besides,  what  sort  of  infallibility  is  that  which  has  tolerated 
the  Inquisition,  applauded  the  St.  Bartholomew  massacre, 
preached  crusades  against  the  heretics  in  France,  massacred 
the  Protestants  in  Holland,  burned  ten  thousands  at  the  stake 
in  Spain  ?  If  it  be  said  that  Protestants  also  have  persecuted, 
we  reply,  that  they  did  it  against  their  own  principles,  but 
that  the  Catholics  persecuted  in  accordance  with  theirs  ;  and 
that  the  Church  which  claims  exclusive  infallibility  and  holi- 
ness has  no  right  to  excuse  itself  because  it  has  done  no  worse 
than  those  which  it  denounces  as  being  in  error  and  sin. 

§  3.  The  Protestant  Orthodox  Idea  of  the  Chiirch.  —  Prot- 
estantism does  not  claim  for  its  Church  exclusive  holiness  or 
infallibility.  It  defines  the  Church  to  be  "a  congregation  of 
faithful  men,  in  which  the  pure  word  of  God  is  preached,  and 
the  sacraments  duly  administered."  J     Why,  then,  the  reac- 

*  Le  Protestantisme  Liberal  par  le  Pasteur  Bost.    Paris,  Baillifere,  1865. 

t  "II  est  de  fait  que  le  Catholicisme,  qui  eat  essentiellement  un  principe 
d'authorit^,  ne  salt  pas  dire  oil  reside  cette  authority.'' 

X  "Thirty-nine  Articles,  art.  xix."  So  Augs.  Conf.  art.  7:  "  Congregatio 
eanetorum,  in  qua  evangeliuni  rccte  docetur,  et  recte  administrautur  eacramenta." 
But  it  may  be  asked,  WIio  is  to  decide  on  the  "  i-ecte  "1 


THE   CHRISTIAN   CHURCH.  397 

tion  towards  Romanism?  It  is  partly  owing  to  the  passive 
element  in  man  —  the  wish  to  be  governed,  the  weariness  of 
independent  thought,  which  led  Wordsworth  to  say, — 

"  Me  this  unchartered  freedom  tires,"  — 

and   which,  in  "Van  Artevelde,"  declares  that, — 

"  Thought  is  tired  of  wandering  through  the  world, 
And  homeward  fancy  runs  its  baric  ashore,"  — 

and  partly  because  the  Protestant  Churches  are  often  less 
active  and  diligent  in  the  practical  part  of  Christian  work 
than  the  Roman  Catholic  Churches.  Instead  of  a  manly 
Protestantism,  they  give  us  a  diluted  Catholicism.  They  in- 
sist on  a  creed  which  has  neither  antiquity  nor  authority  to 
recommend  it,  on  sacraments  that  are  no  real  sacraments, 
but  only  symbols,  and  on  a  ritual  which  has  neither  the 
beauty  nor  variety  of  the  Roman  worship. 

What  does  the  Protestant  Church  propose  to  itself  as  its 
end?  To  produce  an  abstract  piety,  instead  of  a  concrete 
piety  —  not  a  piety  embodied  in  life  and  conduct,  but  taking 
only  the  form  of  an  inward  experience.  If  the  churches 
should  set  themselves  the  work  of  feeding  the  hungry  and 
clothing  the  naked,  of  removing  the  vices  and  crimes  of  men. 
of  helping  the  outcasts  and  visiting  the  prisoners,  they  would 
have  a  more  living  piety  growing  out  of  this  active  charity. 
Their  prayer  meetings  would  be  much  more  vigorous  when 
they  prayed  in  order  to  work,  than  when  they  pray  in  order  to 
pray.  Men  should  not  be  admitted  into  the  Church  because 
they  are  pious,  but  in.  order  to  become  pious  by  doing  Chris- 
tian work.  By  loving,  practically,  the  brother  they  have 
seen,  they  would  come  to  love  God,  whom  they  have  not 
seen. 

Again :  the  Protestant  Cluirch  feebly  imitates  the  aristoc- 
racy of  the  Romish  Church.  In  order  to  conquer  Romanism, 
we  must  go  on  and  leave  it  behind,  seeking  something  better, 
and  finding  some  more  excellent  way.  Now,  the  sin  of 
34 


898    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

Romanism  is  its  aristocracy ;  Protestantism  ought,  then,  to 
give  us,  in  its  Church,  a  Christian  democracy.  But  it  keeps 
up  the  pernicious  distinction  between  clergy  and  laity,  mak- 
ing the  clergy  a  separate  class,  and  so  justifying  Milton's 
complaint  that  the  "  Presbyter  is  only  the  old  priest  written 
large."  It  makes  a  distinction  between  men  and  women  in 
the  Church,  not  encouraging  the  latter  to  speak  or  to  vote. 
It  makes  a  distinction  between  the  rich  and  poor,  selling  its 
pews  to  those  who  can  buy  them,  and  leaving  those  who  are 
unable  to  do  so  outside  of  the  sanctuary.  It  makes  a  dis- 
tinction between  Orthodox  and  heretics,  excluding  the  latter, 
instead  of  inviting  them  in  where  their  errors  might  be  cor- 
rected. And  finally,  it  makes  an  unchristian  distinction 
between  good  people  and  bad  people  ;  for  while  Jesus,  its 
Master,  made  himself  the  friend  of  publicans  and  sinners,  the 
Church  too  often  turns  to  them  the  cold  shoulder,  and  leaves 
them  to  be  cured  by  the  law,  and  not  the  gospel. 

The  following  saying  of  a  saint  of  the  desert.  Abbot  Agatho, 
is  reported  by  Dr.  Newman,  who  tells  it  as  something  wise 
and  good.  It  seems  to  us  to  illustrate,  with  much  naivete^ 
the  tendency  of  both  Catholic  and  Protestant  Orthodoxy,  to 
put  right  opinion  above  right  conduct. 

"  It  was  heard  by  some  that  Abbot  Agatho  possessed  the 
gift  of  discrimination.  Therefore,  to  make  trial  of  his  tem- 
per, they  said  to  him,  '  We  are  told  that  you  are  sensual  and 
haughty.'  He  answered,  '  That  is  just  it.'  They  said  again, 
'  Are  you  not  that  Agatho  who  has  such  a  foul  tongue  ? '  He 
answered,  '  I  am  he.'  Then  they  said,  '  Are  not  you  Agatho 
the  heretic  ?  '  He  made  answer,  '  No.'  Then  they  asked  him 
why  he  had  been  patient  of  so  much,  but  would  not  put  up 
with  this  last.  He  answered,  '  By  those  I  was  but  casting 
on  me  evil ;  but  by  this  I  should  be  severing  me  from  God.'  " 

According,  therefore,  to  Agatho  and  Dr.  Newman,  the 
tongue  "  which  is  set  on  fire  of  hell,"  does  not  separate  us 
from  God,  but  an   error   of  opinion   does.     Pride,  "  which 


THE   CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  309 

comes  before  a  fall,"  aud  sensuality,  which  makes  of  a  man  a 
beast,  do  not  come  between  the  soul  and  God  so  much  as  an 
honest  error  of  opinion. 

The  Protestant  Church  fails  to  overcome  the  Catholic 
Church  only  by  being  too  much  like  the  latter.  With  Prot- 
estant ideas,  we  have  semi-Catholic  Churches.  We  claim 
as  our  fundamental  principle  the  right  of  private  judgment, 
and  then  denounce  and  exclude  those  who  differ  from  us. 
We  claim  that  the  soul  is  not  to  be  saved  by  monkish  seclu- 
t;ion,  by  going  away  from  the  world ;  and  yet  we  do  not 
preach  and  carry  out  in  our  church-action  the  purpose  of 
saving  the  bodies  of  men  as  well  as  their  souls.  When  the 
Protestant  Church  work  gets  more  into  harmony  with  Prot- 
estant ideas,  we  shall  then  see  fewer  relapses  into  Romanism. 

§  4.  Christ's  Idea  of  a  Church,  or  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven. 
—  The  Roman  Catholics  having  made  the  visible  Church,  or 
outward  Christian  community,  the  central  idea  of  Christian- 
ity, and  having  changed  this  into  a  close  corporation  of 
priests,  it  was  natural,  perhaps,  that  Protestants  should  go  too 
far  in  another  direction.  Accordingly,  the  central  idea  in 
Protestantism  is  not  the  Church,  but  the  salvation  of  the 
soul ;  not  social,  but  personal  religion  ;  not  the  Christian 
community,  but  personal  development ;  not  the  kingdom  of 
heaven  here,  but  heaven  in  a  future  life.  Yet  it  is  true,  and 
has  been  shown  lately  with  great  power,*  that  the  direct  and 
immediate  object  of  Jesus  was  to  establish  a  community  of 
believers.  This  was  implied  in  his  being  the  Chi'ist,  —  for 
the  Christ  was  to  be  the  head  of  the  kingdom  of  heaven, — 
aud  the  kingdom  of  heaven  was  to  be  an  earthly  and  human  in- 
stitution. Jesus  took  the  idea  of  the  kingdom  of  God,  as  it  was 
announced  by  the  prophets ;  purified,  developed,  deepened, 
and  widened  it ;  and  it  resulted  in  his  varied  descriptions 
of  the  "  kingdom  of  heaven."  This  phrase,  in  the  mouth  of 
Jesus,  expresses  essentially  what  we  mean  by  "  the  Church." 

•  In  tho  remarkable  work  "  Ecce  Homo 


400     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

This  will  appear  more  plainly  if  we  sum  up  the  principal 
meanings  of  the  phrase  "  kingdom  of  God  "  in  the  New  Tes- 
tament.    It  is,  — 

1.  Something  near  at  hand. 

Mark  1:15.  "  The  kingdom  of  God  is  at  hand."  Luke 
9:27.  "  There  are  some  standing  here  who  shall  not  taste 
of  death  till  they  see  the  kingdom  of  God."  Mark  9:1. 
"  There  be  some  of  them  which  stand  here  which  shall  not 
taste  of  death  till  they  have  seen  the  kingdom  of  God  come 
with  power." 

2.  It  ivas  already  beginning. 

Luke  17  :  20.  "  And  when  he  was  demanded  of  the  Phar- 
isees when  the  kingdom  of  God  should  come,  he  answered 
them  and  said.  The  kingdom  of  God  cometh  not  with  ob- 
servation, neither  shall  they  say,  Lo,  here  !  or,  Lo,  there ! 
for  behold,  the  kingdom  of  God  is  within  (or  '  among ')  you." 

3.  It  was  not  of  this  world. 

John  18  :  36.  Jesus  said,  "  My  kingdom  is  not  of  this 
world." 

4.  But  was  to  be  in  this  loorld. 

Matt.  6  :  10.  "  Thy  kingdom  come,  thy  will  be  done  on 
earth,  as  it  is  in  heaven." 

5.  In  some  respects  it  was  to  he  an  outioard  and  visible 
kingdom,  or  an  outioard  institution. 

Parable  of  the  grain  of  mustard-seed.     Matt.  13  J  31,  32. 

6.  It  woidd  contain  good  and  bad. 
Parable  of  the  net.     Matt.  13:47. 

7.  It  would  belong  to  Christ. 

Col.  1  :  13.  "  Hath  translated  us  into  the  kingdom  of 
his  Son."  Luke  22  :  30.  "  Ye  shall  eat  and  drink  in  my 
kingdom."  John  18 :  36.  ^  My  kingdom  is  not  of  this 
world."  Matt.  16  :  28.  "  Shall  see  the  Son  of  man  coming 
in  his  kingdom." 

8.  It  woxdd  be  finally  given  tip  to  God. 

1  Cor.  15  :  24.  "  Then  the  end  ;  when  he  shall  have  de- 
livered up  the  kingdom  to  God.  even  the  Father,"  &c. 


THE   CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  401 

9.  It  is  a  spiritual  kingdom. 

Kom.  14:17.  "  For  the  kingdom  of  God  is  not  meat  and 
drink,  but  righteousness,  peace,  and  joy  in  the  Holy  Ghost." 

10.  Flesh  and  blood  cannot  inherit  it. 

1  Cor.  15  :  50.  "  Flesh  and  blood  cannot  inherit  the  king- 
dom of  God  ;  neither  doth  corrupiiou  inherit  incorruption." 

11.  The  conditions  of  admission  are  spiritual. 

John  3:3.  "  Except  a  man  be  born  again,"  &c.  Matt. 
5:3.  "  Blessed  are  the  poor  in  spirit,"  &c.  1  Cor.  6  :  9. 
"  The  unrighteous  shall  not  inherit  the  kingdom  of  God." 
See  Gal.  5:21.     Eph.  5:5. 

12.  The  kingdom  was  to  he  established  by  the  Son  of  man 

at  his  coming. 

Matt.  24  :  30  ;  25  : 1.  "  They  shall  see  the  Son  of  man 
coming*  in  the  'clouds  of  heaven,"  &c.  "  Then  shall  the 
kingdom  of  heaven  be  likened."  * 

♦  Tholuck,  in  his  charming  work  on  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  ^P-^f  ^J^u^  = 
("  Bergpredicft  ChrUt.  von  A.  Tholuck.-)  "  Two  principal  defects  are  fonnd  m 
the  usual  treatment  of  this  doctrine  :  First,  the  different  aspects  and  relations 
of  the  kin-dom  of  God  are  by  many  considered  as  different  meamngs  o  the 
word,  and  are  left  standing  side  by  side,  without  any  attempt  to  ground  their 
unTty  in  some  fundamental  idea.  Or,  secondly,  and  still  worse,  a  single  aspect 
of  the  term  is  taken  up,  and  the  rest  are  wholly  neglected.  l^-^an'Pl^^  ^[^^^ 
first  defect  are  to  be  found  in  Z^vingle,  in  his  note  to  John  3:3.  (Here  the  king- 
dom of  God  is  considered  as  divine  doctrine  and  preaching  ottlie  gospel,  as  m 
Luke  18  ;  sometimes  it  is  taken  for  eternal  life.  Matt.  25  ;  Luke  H ;  Bomet.mes 
for  the  church  and  congregation  of  the  laithful,  as  Matt.  13 :24  )     The  later 

e^co.^raphers,  as  Schleusner  and  Rretschneider,  have  not  avoided  these  vague 

tJ^eS  ;  and  the  last  of  them  is  particularly  defective  in  his  artic  e  on  this 
phras  Tr^hl  more  correctly  sums  np  all  these  signittcations  of  the  word 
Sus  :  '  Happiness,  present  and  future,  obtained  through  Chnst.'  Bu  m  this 
definition  the  noti\)n  of  '  a  kingdom  '  is  omitted.  The  opposi  e  ^^ff  .^^  _^ak- 
?n'  onlv  one  of  the  meanings  of  the  matter,  to  the  neglect  ol  the  rest,  is  to  be 
found,  -for  example,  in  Koppe  and  Keil,  according  to  whom  tUe  e.Kpression  re- 
lates merely  to  the  future  reigu  of  the  Messiah  one  day  to  be  t^'^t'^'^lf.'''^^; 

"  C  ur  own  explanation  af  this  expression  starts  from  the  phrase  '  '^■"gdom  of 
God,'  which  explains  the  others, '  kingdom  of  heaven '  and  '  kingdom  of  Chris  . 
?ye  hiuk  that  he  fundamental  idea  has  been  gra.ped  by  none  more  correctly 
than  by  Origen  among  the  ancients,  and  by  Calvin  among  the  reformers.  Tl^ 
Phase  of  the  idea  principally  dwelt  upon  by  the  Church  Fathers  may  be  seen  m 
?hrexplanation' f  the  third  petition  of  the  Lord's  f  ^^^'/l-h  AugnBtme 

especially  examines  profoundly.    Most  of  them  understand  by  it  the  realm 

34* 


402     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

Christ,  therefore,  had  in  his  mind,  as  the  direct  object  of 
his  coming,  to  cause  God's  kingdom  to  come,  and  his  "will  to 
be  done  on  earth  as  in  Iieaven.  It  was  not  his  direct  pur- 
pose to  teach  the  truth  in  abstract  forms,  like  the  philosophers  ; 
nor  to  make  atonement  by  his  death  for  human  sins  ;  nor  to 
set  an  example  of  a  holy  life  ;  nor  to  make  a  revelation  of 
God  and  immortality ;  nor  to  communicate  new  life  to  the 
world.  These  he  did  ;  but  they  came  as  a  part  of  the  king- 
dom of  heaven.  They  were  included  in  this  great  idea. 
His  kingdom  was  a  kingdom  of  truths  in  which  his  word  was 
to  be  the  judge.  He  was  to  reconcile  the  world  to  God  by 
his  death.  He  was  to  show  what  man  was  made  to  be  and 
could  become.  He  was  to  reveal  God  as  a  Father  to  his 
human  children.  He  was  to  set  in  motion  a  tide  of  new 
spiritual  life.  But  the  method  by  which  all  this  was  to  be 
done  was  the  method  of  a  community  of  disciples  and  breth- 
ren, who  should  be  his  apostles  and  missionaries.  They 
were  to  be  an  outward,  visible  association  witli  the  symbols 
of  baptism  and  the  supper.  Tliey  were  also  to  be  an  in- 
fluence in  the  world,  a  current  of  religious  life.  We  find 
that  such  was  the  result.  We  see  the  disciples  embodied 
and  united  in  a  visible  community,  which  spread  through  all 
the  Roman  empire,  which  soon  had  its  teachers,  officers,  its 
meetings,  its  worship,  its  sacred  books,  its  sacred  days.  But 
we  find  also  the  larger  and  deeper  current  of  life,  which  con- 
stitutes the  invisible  Church,  flowing,  like  a  great  river,  down 
through  the  centuries.  Ail  Christians  in  all  Christian  lands 
drink  from  this  stream,  and  all  their  ideas  of  God,  man,  duty, 

of  glory,  the  future  revelation  of  Christ.  Origeu  alone,  in  his  book  on  Prayer, 
takes  .1  more  exact  view  of  the  subject.  In  like  manner  Calvin,  in  his  Coni- 
mentary  on  the  Harmony.  So  Luther,  in  his  fine  Sermon  on  the  Kingdom  of 
God.  Our  own  fundamental  view  we  express  thus  :  '  A  community  in  which 
God  reigns,  not  by  force,  but  by  being  obeyed  freely  from  love,  and  which  is 
therefore  necessarily  united  in  itself  by  mutual  love.'  The  Saviour  came  upon 
the  earth  to  found  such  a  community,  and  since  it  can  only  be  completely 
established  after  he  has  conquered  all  his  enemies,  this  kingdom  of  Christ  be- 
longs in  its  perfection  to  the  other  world." 


THE    CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  403 

immortality,  are  colored  and  tinged  by  it.  We  read  the 
Bible  by  the  light  of  the  convictions  we  absorbed  at  our 
mother's  knee  in  our  infancy.  We  carry  on  our  churches  in 
the  power  of  the  holy  traditions  which  have  become  a  part 
of  our  nature.  Thex*e  is  a  Christian  consciousness  which 
grows  up  in  every  child  who  is  boru  in  Christendom,  and  is 
the  best  part  of  his  nature.  This  makes  him  a  member  of 
the  invisible  Church  before  he  outwardly  becomes  a  member 
of  the  visible  Christian  community. 

§  5.  Church  of  the  Leaven^  or  the  Invisible  Chrcrch.  — 
There  are  two  parables  of  Christ  which  apply  to  the  Church 
visible  and  invisible.  The  Church  Visible  is  the  Church  of 
the  Mustard-seed ;  the  Church  Invisible  is  the  Church  of  the 
Leaven.  The  former  is  an  organization,  the  latter  an  in- 
Jluence  ;  the  one  is  body,  and  the  other  spirit.  The  Visible 
Church  is  limited  by  certain  boundaries  ;  defined  by  its  wor- 
ship, creeds,  officers,  assemblies,  forms.  It  has  its  holy 
days,  holy  places,  holy  men,  holy  books.  But  the  Invisible 
Church  is  not  limited  by  any  such  boundaries  ;  it  exists 
wherever  goodness  exists.  The  Church  of  the  Leaven  is  to 
be  found  inside  and  outside  of  Orthodoxy ;  inside  and  out- 
side of  professing  Christianity  ;  among  Jews,  Mohammedans, 
Heathen  ;  among  Deists  and  unbelievers  of  all  sorts,  who 
build  better  than  they  know.  For  says  Jesus,  "  The  wind 
bloweth  where  it  listeth,  and  Ave  hear  the  sound  thereof.  .  .  . 
So  is  every  one  who  is  born  of  the  Spirit."  A  locomotive 
must  run  on  a  track,  a  wagon  on  a  road.  But  there  is 
no  track  laid  through  the  sky  for  the  south  wind ;  there  is 
no  time-table  to  determine  the  starting  and  arriving  of  the 
soft  breeze  which  comes  from  the  far  prairies,  laden  with  the 
sweet  fragrance  of  ten  thousand  flowers. 

"  So  is  every  one  who  is  born,  of  the  Spirit."  Get  out 
your  Catechism,  my  Orthodox  friend  ;  establish,  dear  Meth- 
odist brother,  your  experience  to  determine  whether  one  is 
converted  or  no.     Settle  for  yourself,  excellent  formalist,  the 


404     OETHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

signs  of  the  true  Church,  out  of  which  there  is  no  salvation ; 
and  when  you  have  got  all  your  fences  arranged,  and  your 
gates  built  to  your  satisfaction,  you  are  obliged  to  throw 
them  all  down  with  your  own  hands,  to  let  the  Church  op 
THE  Leaven  pass  through.  "  Nobody  can  be  saved,"  says 
Dogmatic  Christianity,  "  who  does  not  believe  in  the  Trinity 
and  the  Atonement."  "  Nobody  can  be  saved,"  says  Sen- 
timental Christianity,  "  who  has  not  had  a  conscious 
change  of  heart."  "  Nobody  can  be  saved,"  says  Formal 
Christianity,  "  who  is  out  of  the  true  Church  and  its  sacra- 
ments." Here  are  the  three  fences  of  the  Church  of  the 
Mustard-seed.  But  see  !  here  comes  an  innumerable  multi- 
tude of  little  children,  who  have  never  believed  in  Trinity 
or  Atonement ;  have  never  been  baptized  at  all ;  have 
never  been  converted.  Yet  neither  Dogmatist,  Sentimental- 
ist, nor  Formalist  dares  to  exclude  them  from  heaven. 
Logic  steps  aside  ;  good  feeling  opens  the  three  gates ;  and 
the  little  ones  all  walk  quietly  to  the  good  Shepherd,  who 
says,  "  Let  them  come  to  me,  and  forbid  them  not ;  "  gather- 
ing the  lambs  in  his  arms,  carrying  them  in  his  bosom,  and 
tenderly  leading  them  in  the  green  pastures  beside  the  still 
waters. 

The  little  children  must  be  allowed  to  go  through  ;  con- 
sistency requires  them  to  be  damned ;  but  consistency  must 
take  care  of  itself;  so  much  the  worse  for  consistency.  But 
who  comes  next?  Here  are  all  the  heathen,  who  have  not 
heard  of  Christ.  Must  they  be  damned  ?  According  to  the 
creeds,  yes ;  but  modern  Orthodoxy  has  its  doubts ;  its 
heart  has  grown  tender.  Somehow  or  other  we  think  tliat 
we  shall  have  to  let  them  pass,  before  a  great  while.  Then 
here  are  all  the  people  whom  we  have  known  and  loved. 
They  did  not  believe  as  they  should.  They  Avere  never  con- 
verted, so  far  as  we  know ;  they  were  not  members  of  any 
Church,  true  or  false.  But  we  loved  them.  Cannot  the 
three  fences  be  put  aside  again,  just  to  let  these  friends  of 


THE   CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  405 

ours  pass  by.  "What  kind-hearted  Orthodox  man  or  woman 
was  ever  wanting  in  an  excuse  for  letting  his  heretical 
friends  into  heaven.  "  He  changed  his  views  very  essential- 
ly before  he  died.  He  used  very  Orthodox  language,  to  my 
certain  knowledge.  He  said  he  relied  on  the  merits  of 
Christ ;  or,  at  least,  he  said  he  believed  in  Christ."  And  so 
all  the  good  and  kind  dead  people  must  follow  all  the  little 
children,  and  pass  the  triple  fence.  They  do  not  belong  to  the 
Church  of  the  Mustard-seed  ;  but  they  belong  to  the  Church 
of  the  Leaven.  These  fences  are  like  the  flaming  wall  in 
Tasso  ;  they  seem  impassable,  but  as  soon  as  one  comes  up  to 
them  they  are  found  to  be  nothing.  Blessed  be  God  that 
common  sense  is  stronger  than  logic  ;  that  Immanity  is  strong- 
er thar  forms  ;  and  that  large,  kind  Christian  hearts  are  more 
than  a  match  for  the  somewhat  narrow  Christian  head. 

§  6.  The  Church  of  the  Mustard-seed. — This  is  not  the 
spirit,  but  the  body  ;  not  the  life,  but  the  organization  of  that 
life.  There  is  no  doubt  that  we  need  a  Church  visible  as 
well  as  a  Church  invisible  ;  need  a  body  as  well  as  a  soul ; 
and  it  is  a  very  important  question  what  sort  of  a  body  we 
shall  have.  Soul,  no  doubt,  is  infinitely  more  important  than 
body  ;  still  we  do  not  wish  our  body  to  be  lame,  blind,  or  dys- 
peptic. Because  soul  is  better  than  body,  we  do  not  like 
rheumatism  or  neuralgia.  Our  visible  Church,  the  body  of 
Christ,  is  sometimes  a  little  dyspeptic,  and  goes  about  look- 
ing very  gloomy  and  miserable,  when  it  ought  to  be  as  gay 
as  a  lark.  Sometimes  also  it  seems  to  be  rheumatic  ;  at  any 
rate,  it  cannot  go  and  attend  to  its  work.  It  is  very  subject 
to  fever  and  ague ;  plenty  of  meetings  to-day,  all  alive 
with  zeal  and  heat,  but  to-morrow  it  is  cold  and  shivering. 
It  has  its  pulmonary  disease  too  ;  its  lungs  arc  not  strong 
enough  to  speak  when  it  ought ;  to  cry  out  for  truth  and 
right  in  the  day  of  trial.  And  as  we  find  that  hygienics  are 
better  than  therapeutics  for  physical  diseases,  so,  perhaps,  it 
■will  be  better  for  us  to  prevent  the  diseases  of  the  Church  by 


406    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

wise  arrangements,  which  shall  give  it  air,  exercise,  and  a 
wholesome  diet,  than  to  cure  it,  when  sick,  bj  the  usual 
medicine  of  rebuke,  reproof,  and  ascetic  mortification. 

The  visible  Church  may  be  looked  at  in  four  points  of 
view.     "We  may  consider  it  as,  — 

1.  The  Primitive  Church,  or  Church  as  it  was. 

2.  The  Church  Actual,  or  Church  as  it  is. 

3.  The  Ideal  Church,  or  Church  as  it  ought  to  be. 

4.  The  Possible  Church,  or  Church  as  it  can  be.  . 

§  7.  Primitive  and  Apostolic  Church,  or  Church  as  it  loas. 
—  If  we  study  the  nature,  organization,  and  character  of  the 
primitive  Christian  Church,  as  it  appears  in  the  book  of  Acts 
and  in  the  Epistles,  we  recognize  easily  the  warm,  loving  life 
which  was  in  its  spring  time,  when  all  buds  were  swelling, 
and  all  flowers  opening.  It  was  far  from  being  a  perfect 
Church.  It  had  many  errors,  and  included  many  vices. 
Some  persons  in  the  Church  did  not  believe  in  the  resurrec- 
tion of  the  dead.  (1  Cor. '15  :  12.)  Some  disciples  had  not 
heard  there  was  a  Holy  Ghost.  (Acts  19  :  2.)  Some  even 
became  intoxicated  at  the  Lord's  Supper.  (1  Cor.  11  :  21, 
o;  Si  fiedvei.)  Some  Christians  had  to  be  told  not  to  steal 
(Eph.  4 :  28)  ;  nor  to  lie,  (Col.  3:9);  nor  to  commit  other 
immoralities.  Peter  (supposed  to  be  the  infallible  head  of 
the  Church)  was  rebuked  by  Paul  for  dissimulation.  Paul 
and  Barnabas  could  not  get  along  together,  but  quarrelled, 
and  had  to  separate.  Part  of  the  Church  Judaized,  and  de- 
nounced Paul  as  a  false  apostle.  Another  part  Paganized, 
and  carried  Pauline  liberty  into  license.  And  yet,  though 
there  was  so  little  of  completed  Christian  character,  there 
was  a  great  amount  of  spiritual  life  in  the  apostolic  Church. 
They  are  styled  saints,  but  never  was  anything  less  saintly 
than  the  state  of  things  in  the  beginning.  But  they  were 
looking  the  right  way,  and  going  in  the  right  direction. 
They  were  full  of  faith,  zeal,  enthusiasm,  and  inspiration ; 
so  they  had  in  themselves  the  promise  and  expectation  of 
saintship,   if  not  its  reality. 


THE   CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  407 

Directly  after  the  ascension  of  Christ,  and  the  wonderful 
experiences  of  the  day  of  Pentecost,  we  find  the  Christian 
community  in  active  operation.  Its  organization  was  as  yet 
very  indetinite  ;  that  was  to  come  by  degrees. 

It  was  a  Church  without  a  creed  ;  its  only  creed  was  a 
declaration  of  faith  in  Jesus  as  the  Christ,  the  Son  of  God. 
It  was  a  Church  without  a  bishop,  or  a  single  head  of  any 
kind ;  for  Peter,  James,  and  John  seem  all  three  to  have 
possessed  an  equal  influence  in  it,  and  that  influence  was 
derived  from  their  character.  Paul  tells  us  expressly,  in  the. 
Epistle  to  the  Galatians,  that  when  he  went  up  to  Jerusalem, 
long  after  his  convei'siou,  Peter,  James,  and  John  "  seemed 
to  be  pillars  "  there.  No  mention  is  made  anywhere  in  the 
book  of  Acts  of  a  single  bishop  presiding  over  the  Church  at 
Jerusalem,  or  over  any  other  Church.  And  as  to  the  Ro- 
mish Church,  which  claims  to  be  the  oldest  Church,  and  the 
mother  of  all  the  rest,  it  was  not  yet  founded  at  all,  when 
the  Church  at  Jerusalem  was  established.  Nor  was  the 
Church  at  Rome  as  old  as  the  Churches  at  Autioch,  at 
Lystra,  at  Iconium,  and  elsewhere,  for  Paul  and  Barnabas 
ordained  elders  in  all  these  churches,  as  we  are  expressly 
told  in  Acts  lith  ;  and  in  Acts  15  :  7  we  find  Peter  still  at 
Jerusalem.  If  there  was  any  church  at  Rome,  Peter  was  not 
its  bishop  ;  then  either  it  was  a  church  without  a  bishop,  or 
Peter  Avas  not  its  first  bishop. 

We  find  also  that  as  the  apostolic  Chur.ch  had  no  creed  and 
no  bishop,  neither  had  it  any  fixed  or  settled  forms.  Its 
forms  and  usages  grew  up  naturally,  according  as  conven- 
ience required.  Thus  (Acts  6  : 1-5)  we  find  that  the  apos- 
tles recommended  the  disciples  to  choose  seven  persons  to 
attend  to  the  distribution  of  charity.  "  A  murmuring  arose  " 
because  the  Greek  widows  were  neglected  —  neglected,  prob- 
ably, because  not  so  well  known  as  the  others.  This  shows 
that  there  were  no  fixed,  established  forms ;  even  the  order 
of  deacons  was  originated  to  meet  an  occasion. 


408         orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

That  they  had  no  form  of  service,  no  fixed  Liturgy,  in  the 
apostolic  Church,  appears  from  1  Cor.  14  :  26.  "  How  is  it, 
brethren,  when  ye  come  together,  every  one  of  you  hath  a 
psalm,  a  doctrine,  a  tongue,  a  revelation,  an  interpretation? 
Let  the  prophets  speak,  two  or  three,  and  the  others  judge, 
and  if  anything  be  revealed  to  another  that  sitteth  by,  let  the 
first  hold  his  peace.  Ye  may  all  prophesy  one  by  one,  that  all 
may  learn,  and  all  be  comforted."  Now,  it  is  very  evident 
no  fixed  or  formal  service  could  have  been  established  in  the 
chui'ches  whea  he  recommended  this. 

But  though  the  apostolic  Church  had  neither  bishop,  nor 
creed,  nor  fixed  forms,  nor  a  fixed  body  of  officers,  it  had 
something  better  —  it  had  faith  in  God,  and  mutual  love. 
"  The  multitude  of  them  that  believed  were  of  one  heart  and 
one  soul ;  neither  said  any  man  that  aught  that  he  possessed 
was  his  own,  but  they  had  all  things  common."  We  do  not 
find  an  absolute  community  of  property  established  by  a  law 
of  the  Church,  as  in  the  monastic  orders,  or  as  in  the  school 
of  Pythagoras,  and  some  modern  communities,  as  that  of  St. 
Simon ;  for  Peter  says  to  Ananias,  of  his  property,  "  While 
it  remained,  was  it  not  thine  own  ?  and  after  it  was  sold,  was 
it  not  in  thine  own  power  ?  "  But  though  their  property  was 
in  their  own  power,  they  did  not  call  it  their  own,  or  con- 
sider it  so ;  it  belonged  to  God :  they  were  only  stewards, 
and  they  readily  brought  it,  and  gave  it  to  the  use  of  the 
Church. 

The  apostolic  Church  was  a  home  of  peace  and  joy. 
Whatever  tribulations  they  might  have  in  the  world,  when 
they  met  together  they  met  Christ,  and  ate  their  meat  with 
gladness  and  singleness  of  heart.  They  were  in  an  atmos- 
phere of  love  and  freedom.  We  hear  of  no  rules,  no  laws, 
no  constraining  forms  ;  but  all  were  led  by  the  Spirit  of  God. 
Even  in  their  public  service,  as  we  have  seen,  though  Paul 
recommended  a  greater  order,  it  was  not  based  on  authority, 
but  on  the  sense  of  propriety  of  each  individual,  because 
God  was  not  the  God  of  confusion,  but  of  peace. 


THE   CHRISTIAN   CHURCH.  409 

Such  was  the  original  Church,  as  described  in  the  Act? 
and  Epistles.  It  sprang  up  because  it  was  wanted,  and 
Christ  foresaw  that  it  would  be.  It  was  founded  not  on  an 
arbitrary  command,  but  on  the  needs  of  human  nature.  Man 
is  not  a  solitary,  but  a  social  being.  He  needs  society  in  his 
labors  and  in  his  joys ;  society  in  study,  society  in  relaxa- 
tion. Even  in  the  highest  act  of  his  life,  —  in  the  act  of 
prayer,  in  communion  with  God ;  in  that  act,  called  by  an 
ancient  Platonist  "  the  flight  of  one  alone  to  the  only  One," 
—  even  then  he  cannot  be  alone.  In  the  union  of  man  with 
man  in  any  natural  and  true  relation,  his  thought  becomes 
more  clear,  his  will  more  firm,  his  devotion  more  profound, 
his  affections  more  enlarged.  The  broader  and  deeper  the 
basis  of  the  union,  the  more  it  blesses  and  helps  him.  A 
friendship  based  upon  the  knowledge  and  love  of  the  same 
God,  what  can  be  better  for  us  than  this? 

Thus  Ave  see  that  the  apostolic  Church  was  a  home  for 
Chi-ist's  family  (Matt.  12:49)  ;  a  school  for  his  disciples; 
a  fraternity  of  brethren.  For  discipline,  it  had  officers,  but 
no  clergy,  nor  priesthood,  for  all  were  priests,  and  all  took 
part  in  the  services.  (1  Peter  2:5;  Rom.  1  :  6  ;  1  Cor.  14  : 
26.)  Its  only  creed  was  a  belief  in  Jesus  as  the  Christ,  the 
Son  of  God.  (Acts  8:  37;  16:31.  lJohn4:l5;  5:5,10. 
Rom.  10  : 9.)  The  unity  of  the  Church  was  not  the  unity 
of  opinion,  nor  the  unity  of  ceremonies,  but  the  bond  of  the 
Spirit  (Eph.  4:3),  and  the  central  unities  of  faith,  not  of 
doctrine  (Eph.  4:5.)  The  object  of  the  Church  service  Avas 
not  merely  to  partake  the  Lord's  Supper  together,  nor  to  main- 
tain public  worship,  nor  to  defend  and  propagate  a  creed,  nor 
to  call  men  into  an  outward  organization,  nor  to  gather  pious 
people  together,  and  keep  them  safe  as  in  an  ark,  but  to  do 
good  and  get  good  —  to  grow  up  in  all  things  into  Him  who 
is  the  Head.  And  the  condition  of  membership  was  to  wish 
to  be  saved  from  sin,  and  to  have  faith  in  Christ  that  he  could 
save  them  ;  it  was  to  hunger  and  thirst  after  righteousness. 
35 


410  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND    ERRORS. 

§  8.  The  Actual  Church,  or  the  Church  as  it  is.  —  Now, 
if  we  turn  from  the  Church  as  it  was  to  the  Church  as  it  is,  — 
from  the  apostolic  Church  to  those  around  us,  —  we  see  a  dif- 
ference. Instead  of  the  freedom  and  union  which  were  in 
the  early  Church,  we  find  in  the  Roman  Catholic  communion 
union,  but  no  freedom  ;  in  the  Protestant  Churches  freedom, 
but  no  union.  In  both  we  find  the  Church  built  on  the  min- 
istry, instead  of  the  ministry  on  the  Church  ;  the  priests 
everything,  the  people  nothing ;  fixed  forms,  instead  of  a 
free  movement ;  dead  creeds,  instead  of  a  living  faith.  The 
spirit  of  worldliness  has  entered  the  churches,  and  they  try  to 
serve  God  and  Mammon  ;  God  on  Sunday,  and  Mammon  on 
the  week  days.  The  members  of  the  churches  are  more  de- 
vout and  more  religious,  but  not  more  moral  or  more  humane, 
than  many  who  are  out  of  their  body.  And  because  they  do 
not  love  man  whom  they  have  seen,  they  find  it  hard  to  love 
God,  whom  they  have  not  seen.  Their  want  of  humanity 
destroys  their  piety. 

A  vast  amount  of  good  is  done  by  the  churches,  even  in 
their  present  state ;  but  when  we  think  of  what  they  might 
do,  it  seems  nothing.  Yet  it  is  not  nothing.  Could  we  know 
the  good  done  by  the  mere  sound  of  the  church  bells  on  Sun- 
day, by  the  quiet  assembling  of  peaceful  multitudes  in  their 
different  churches  ;  could  we  measure  the  amount  of  awe  and 
reverence  which  falls  over  every  mind,  restraining  the  reck- 
less, checking  many  a  half-formed  purpose  of  evil,  rousing 
purer  associations  and  memories,  calling  up  reminiscences  of 
innocent  childhood  in  the  depraved  heart  of  man  ;  could  we 
know  how  many  souls  are  roused  to  a  better  life,  made  to 
realize  their  immortal  nature,  reminded  of  a  judgment  to 
come  ;  could  we  see  how  many  souls,  on  every  Sabbath,  in 
our  thousands  of  churches,  are  turned  from  sin  to  God, 
how  many  sorrowing  hearts  are  consoled  by  the  sweet  prom- 
ises of  the  gospel ;  could  we  see,  as  God  sees  and  the  angels 
see,  all  this, —  we  should  feel  that  the  churches,  in  their  greatest    _ 


THE   CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  411 

feebleness,  are  yet  the  iustrumeuts  of  au  iucalculablc  good. 
But  when  we  look  at  what  is  to  be  done,  what  ought  to  be 
done,  what  could  be  done  by  them,  their  present  state  seems 
most  forlorn. 

It  is  one  of  the  most  ditficult  of  our  duties  not  to  despise 
au  imperfect  good,  and  yet  not  to  be  satisfied  with  it. 

One  of  the  greatest  evils  of  our  churches  is,  that  they  are 
(;liurclies  of  the  clergy,  not  of  the  people.  Our  clergy  ai'e 
generally  pure-minded,  well-iutentioued  men,  less  selfish  and 
worldly  than  most  men ;  but  they  are  not  equal  to  the  de- 
mauds  of  their  position.  We  take  a  young  man,  send  him 
to  college,  then  to  a  theological  school,  where  he  studies  his 
Greek  very  faithfully,  aud  learns  to  write  sermons.  He 
comes  out,  twenty-two  years  old,  a  pleasing  speaker,  and  is 
immediately  settled  and  ordained  over  a  large  long-established 
church.  As  he  rises  in  the  pulpit  and  looks  down  on  his 
congregation,  one  would  think  he  would  despair.  What  can 
he  say  to  them?  He  knows  nothing  of  human  nature,  of  its 
struggles  and  sins,  its  temptations  in  the  shop  and  the 
street.  Men  do  not  curse  at  him,  nor  try  to  cheat  him,  nor 
entice  him  into  bar-rooms,  oyster-cellars,  billiard-rooms,  aud 
theatres.  He  cannot  speak  to  meu  of  their  vices,  their 
stony  and  hard  hearts,  their  utter  unbelief,  their  crying  self- 
ishness, for  he  knows  nothing  of  it.  He  must  speak  of  sin 
in  the  abstract,  not  of  sin  in  the  concrete.  If  he  did,  what 
could  he  say?  What  weapons  has  he?  The  sword  of  the 
Spirit  is  in  his  hands,  but  he  has  not  tried  it ;  he  has  no  con- 
fidence in  it.  The  awful  truths  of  the  Bible,  which  smite  the 
stoutest  sinner  to  the  earth,  these  he  might  utter,  if  he  dared  ; 
but  he  knows  not  how.  And  yet  he  is  the  teacher  of  these 
gray-headed  men,  and  their  only  teacher.  Had  he  gone  out 
as  Jesus  sent  his  disciples,  without  purse  or  shoes  or  two 
coats,  and  preached  the  gospel  for  ten  years  by  the  way-side, 
in  cottages,  in  school-houses,  living  hard,  sleeping  on  the 
floor,  seeing  men  and  women  everywhere  without  disguise, 


412  ORTHODOXY:    ITS  TRUTHS   AND  ERRORS. 

and  taking  no  thought  beforehand  what  to  say,  but  leaning  on 
God  for  his  inspiration,  —  then  might  he  have  learned  how  to 
say  something  weighty  even  to  a  great  congregation.  Or  if 
this  poor  boy  were  surrounded  by  a  living  active  church, 
helping  him  by  advice,  going  with  him  into  the  house  of  sor- 
row, the  haunt  of  sin,  kneeling  with  him  by  the  sick  couch 
and  death-bed,  and  adding  to  his  small  experience  the  whole 
variety  and  richness  of  theirs,  —  then  might  he  be  a  man  of 
God,  thoroughly  furnished  for  every  work. 

If  there  were  Judaism  and  Paganism  in  the  early  Church, 
they  still,  no  doubt,  linger  in  our  churches  to-day.  The 
Church  Judaizes  in  this  —  that  it  still  puts  forms  above  life. 
For  example,  the  Roman  Catholic  Church  teaches  that  if  you 
take  a  child,  and  put  water  upon  liim,  repeating  the  baptismal 
formula,  and  with  the  intention  of  baptizing  him,  the  chUd 
becomes  in  that  moment  regenerate.  If  he  had  died  the 
moment  before,  he  would  have  been  damned  forever  in  eter- 
nal torments ;  if  he  dies  the  moment  after,  he  will  go  to 
eternal  bliss  in  heaven.  Now,  if  an  earthly  parent  should 
cover  his  child's  body  with  camphene,  and  then  set  it  on  fire, 
because  somebody  had  not  baptized  it,  we  should  say  he  was 
a  very  cruel  parent.  But  this  conduct  is  attributed  to  the 
good  God  by  the  Roman  Catholic  doctrine.  Moreover,  when 
an  outward  form  is  made  thus  essential,  when  everlasting 
salvation  or  damnation  depends  on  it,  it  behooves  us  to  know 
what  it  is.  Baptism  consists  of  three  parts  —  the  water,  the 
formula,  and  the  intention  of  the  baptizer.  But  as  to  the 
water,  we  may  ask.  How  much  is  essential?  Is  it  essential 
that  there  be  enough  to  entirely  immerse  the  body?  The 
Catholic  Church  replies,  "  No."  Is  the  aqueous  vapor  al- 
always  present  in  the  air  enough?  It  answers,  "  No,  that  is 
not  enough."  At  what  precise  point,  then,  between  these  two, 
does  enough  begin,  does  baptism  take  place,  and  the  child 
cease  to  be  a  child  of  perdition,  and  become  an  heir  of  sal- 
vation?    The   Roman   Catholic   Church,  being   obliged   to 


THE   CHRISTIAN   CHURCH.  413 

answer  this  question,  has  answered  it  thus :  There  is  no 
baptism  until  water  enough  to  run  is  put  on  the  child.  A 
drop  which  will  not  run,  does  not  baptize  him  ;  a  drop  which 
will  run,  baptizes  him.  The  difference,  then,  between  these 
two  drops,  is  tlie  difference  to  the  child  between  eternal 
damnation  and  eternal  salvation.* 

How  does  this  sound  by  the  side  of  the  declaration  of  the 
apostle  Paul  — "  He  is  not  a  Jew  who  is  one  outwardly, 
neither  is  circumcision  outward  in  the  flesh  ;  but  he  is  a 
Jew  who  is  one  inwardly,  and  circumcision  is  of  the  heart  "  ? 
Judaism,  if  anything,  was  an  outward  institution  ;  Christian- 
ity, if  anything,  is  an  inward  life.  And  yet  that  which  the 
apostle  Paul  said  of  Judaism  we  hardly  to-day  would  venture 
to  say  of  Christianity.  "  He  is  not  a  Christian  who  is  one 
outwardly,  neither  is  Christianity  in  outward  belief,  profes- 
sion, or  aspect ;  but  he  is  a  Christian  who  is  one  inwardly." 
"  O,  no  !  "  we  say,  "  there  must  be  a  distinction.  A  man 
"who  does  not  believe  in  the  miracles,  for  example,  may  be  a 
good  man,  but  you  must  not  call  him  a  Christian."  But  he 
who  follows  Christ,  we  think,  is  a  Christian.  And  as  Christ 
walks  before  mankind  on  the  divine  road  of  goodness,  truth, 
love,  purity,  he  who  walks  on  that  road  cannot  help  being  a 
follower  of  Christ,  whatever  he  may  call  himself. 

How  the  Church  Judaizes  about  the  Sabbath  —  pretending, 
first,  that  there  is  a  Sabbath  in  Christianity,  and  teaching 

*  Ab  eminent  and  learned  gentleman  told  me  of  this  conversation  which  he 
had  with  a  Roman  priest :  "  When  the  wine  of  the  Eucharist  is  consecrated,  it 
becomes  the  real  blood  of  Christ  — does  it  not  ?  "  Priest,  "  It  does."  "  What, 
then,  do  you  do  with  that  which  remains  in  the  cup,  after  communion?" 
Priest,  "We  drink  it."  "Does  not  some  adhere  to  the  glass.'"  Priest, 
"  Yes ;  but  we  wash  the  glass."  "  What  do  you  do  with  the  water  .'  "  Priest, 
"We  drink  it."  "  But  must  there  not  yet  remain,  on  the  napkin,  with  which 
you  wipe  the  glass,  some  portion  of  the  blood  of  Christ,  even  though  it  be  an 
infinitesimal  portion  .'  "  Priest,  "  Yes."  "  Then,  might  it  not  happen  that 
when  the  napkin  is  washed,  this  portion  of  Christ's  blood  may  go  into  the 
water,  and  be  poured  on  the  ground,  and  be  taken  up  by  the  root  of  a  plant  — 
say  a  cabbage.  Would,  then,  the  flesh  of  that  cabbage  contain,  or  would  it  not 
a  portion  of  the  blood  of  Christ  ?  " 

35* 


414         orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

people  that  there  is  a  sort  of  piety  in  calling  Sunday  the  Sah- 
haih,  and  next  putting  this  ritual  observance,  this  abstinence 
from  labor  and  amusement,  on  a  level  with  moral  duties  ! 
When  men  tithe  mint,  they  are  apt  to  forget  justice  and 
mercy.  If  Jesus  Avere  to  return,  after  all  these  centuries, 
and  were  only  to  do  and  say  just  what  he  did  and  said  about 
the  Sabbath  when  he  was  here  before,  there  are  many  pious 
Protestants  who  would  think  him  rather  lax  in  his  religious 
principles.  How  long  he  has  been  with  us,  and  yet  we  have 
not  known  him ! 

An  American  Protestant  bishop  once  forbade  a  clergyman 
of  his  church  to  officiate  again,  because  this  clei'gyman  had 
invited  a  Methodist  minister  to  assist  him  in  the  administra- 
tion of  the  sacrament.  This  is  backsliding  a  good  way  from 
the  position  of  Him  who  said,  "  Forbid  him  not :  he  that  is 
not  against  us  is  with  us."  And  again  :  "  Whosoever  wishes 
to  do  the  will  of  God,  the  same  is  my  mother,  my  sister,  and 
my  brother."  Dear  Master !  is  thy  Church  so  broad  as  to 
include  all  who  desire  to  do  the  will  of  God,  and  are  our 
churches  so  narrow  that  they  cannot  hold  any  but  those  who 
agree  with  us  in  our  little  notions  about  ceremony  and  form  ? 
Hast  thou  been  so  long  time  with  us,  and  yet  have  we  not 
known  thee? 

The  Church  Actual  is  a  timid  Church.  It  is  afraid  of 
truth,  and  afraid  of  love.  Its  creed  is  full  of  mysteries  too 
solemn  and  sacred  to  be  examined.  They  are  the  sealed 
book  of  the  prophet,  which  is  given  to  the  learned  clergy, 
and  to  the  unlearned  laity ;  and  the  answer  of  the  unlearned 
laity  is,  "  We  aa*e  not  learned."  And  the  answer  of  the 
leai'ned  clergy  is,  "  It  is  sealed.  It  is  a  mystery.  We  must 
not  even  try  to  understand  it."  The  Actual  Church  is  not 
fond  of  a  free  examination  of  its  tenets,  but  rather  represses 
it  by  the  flaming  terrors  of  perdition  impending  over  honest 
error. 

The  Church  Actual  sticks  in  the  letter.     How  it  idolizes 


THE    CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  415 

the  Bible  !  But  when  you  ask,  What?  you  fiud  it  is  rather 
the  letter  of  the  Bible  thtui  its  niauly,  geuerous,  humauc,  aud 
holy  spirit.  It  babbles  of  verbal  inspiration  and  literal  in- 
spiration, which  are  phrases  as  absurd  as  it  would  be  to  say 
"  bodily  spirit."  Question  the  inspiration  of  the  letter,  and 
a  thousand  voices  cry,  "  You  are  cutting  away  the  very  foun- 
dations of  our  faith.  If  we  cannot  believe  every  letter  of  the 
Bible  to  be  from  God,  we  have  nothing  to  hold  by."  But 
the  apostle  Paul  thought  somewhat  differently,  when  he  said, 
"Who  hath  also  made  us  able  ministers  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment, not  of  the  letter ,  but  of  the  spirit ;  for  the  letter  killeth^but 
the  spirit  giveth  life." 

The  American  Bible  Society  appointed  a  committee  of 
learned  persons  to  revise  the  present  translation  of  the  Bible 
—  not  to  make  a  new  translation  by  any  means,  but  merely  to 
correct  palpable  blunders  of  the  press,  palpable  errors  in  the 
headings  of  chapters,  or  universally  admitted  mistakes  of  the 
translators.  The  learned  men  did  their  work.  It  was  ex- 
amined, printed  —  about  to  be  published.  But  an  outcry  was 
made,  that  the  Bible  Society,  in  taking  away  these  few  errors 
of  the  press,  was  taking  away  our  Bible.  The  Christian  pub- 
lic, in  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century,  has  been,  so  in- 
structed, that  Avhen  a  few  eiTors  in  the  letter  of  the  outward 
word  are  corrected,  it  cries  out,  "  They  have  taken  away  my 
Lord,  and  I  know  not  where  they  have  laid  him." 

The  Church  Actual  is  sectarian.  Every  church  is  trying 
to  swell  its  numbers  at  the' expense  of  its  neighbors.  We 
do  not  think  that  a  Christian  Church  should  be  constructed 
on  the  principle  of  a  mouse-trap,  which  it  is  easy  enough  to 
get  into,  but  hard  to  get  out  of.  We  do  not  think  it  right 
that  young  persons,  in  the  glow  of  their  piety,  should  be  drawn 
into  a  church,  without  being  told  that  if  they  should  change 
their  views  on  any  important  point,  they  cannot  leave  it  except 
by  being  excommunicated  publicly.  But  there  are  churches 
in  New  England  which  have  many  very  easy  and  agreeable 


416     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS, 

eutrances,  but  only  two  exits  —  very  difficult  and  Clisagree- 
able.  If  one  wishes  to  leave,  he  is  dismissed  wiih  a  letter 
directed  to  some  other  church  of  the  same  creed,  and  not 
till  he  has  joined  some  such  church,  and  a  certificate  is 
sent  back  to  that  effect,  is  he  released  from  his  obligations. 
The  Church  is  therefore  like  a  city  on  a  hill,  with  a  palisade 
fence  all  round,  with  openings  by  which  one  can  get  in,  but 
not  out ;  and  having  only  two  outlets  —  one  by  a  gute  kept 
carefully  locked,  and  the  other  over  a  steep  wall,  fifty  feet  high. 
You  have  your  choice  of  three  things:  1.  Stay  where  you 
are ;  2.  Go  through  the  gate  into  another  palisaded  en- 
closure ;  3.  Be  pitched  down  the  Tarpeian  rock  of  excom- 
munication.* 

Thus  we  see  that  the  Church  Actual  differs  much,  and 
often  for  the  worse,  from  the  Church  Primitive.  It  is  not 
now  a  home  or  a  fraternity,  for  its  members  often  do  not 
know  each  other  by  sight.  It  is  not  a  school  of  disciples,  for 
it  is  thought  necessary  to  take  your  whole  creed  at  once, 
ready  made,  and  not  learn  it  by  degrees.  The  worship  is 
too  often  by  the  minister  and  choir,  the  people  being  onlj 
spectators.  Instead  of  the  simple  o/iginal  faith  in  Jesus  as 
the  Christ,  the  people  are  taught  long  and  complicated  creeds 
Instead  of  a  unity  of  conviction,  seeing  the  same  things,  there 
is  only  a  unity  of  expression,  saying  the  same  things.  In- 
stead of  seeking  to  save  the  outcasts,  infidels,  vicious ; 
churches  are  built  and  occupied  by  Christians  themselves,  as 
though  Christ  came  to  call  only  the  righteous  to  repentance. 
There  may  be,  in  our  great  cities,  a  church  to  every  two 
thousand  persons  ;  but  every  seat  in  every  church  is  bought 
and  occupied  by  the  respectable  and  comfortable  classes. 
The  gospel  is  preached,  but  no  longer  to  the  poor.  There 
is  something  wrong  in  all  this. 

*  See,  in  the  New  York  "  Independent,"  June  9,  1866,  the  account  of  the 
"  Recognition  of  Congregational  Churches  in  Philadelphia,"  where  the  exist- 
ence of  this  principle  is  admitted  and  defended  by  some  eminent  Congregational 
ministers ;  admitted  and  deplored  by  others. 


THE   CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  417 

§  9.  The  Church  Ideal,  or  Church  as  it  ought  to  be.  — The 
Church  Ideal  is  full  of  life,  power,  love,  freedom.  It  is  a 
teaching  Church  ;  calling  men  out  of  darkness  into  marvel- 
lous light,  throwing  light  on  all  the  mysteries  of  human 
existence.  It  takes  the  little  child  aud  teaches  it  concerning 
its  duty  and  destiny.  It  organizes  schools  through  every 
Chi-istian  nation,  so  that  all  Christian  children  shall  be  taugi»t 
of  God,  and  that  groat  shall  be  their  peace.  It  teaches 
systematically  and  thoroughly  all  classes  of  society  ;  so  that 
all,  from  least  to  the  greatest,  know  the  Lord.  It  organizes 
missions  to  all  heathen  lauds,  and  its  missionaries  are  so 
true,  noble,  kind,  so  reflect  the  life  of  Jesus  in  their  own,  that 
the  heathen  come  flying  like  clouds,  and  like  flocks  of  doves, 
to  the  windows  of  the  holy  home.  The  dusky,  and  swarming 
races  of  Hindostau,  the  mild  and  studious  Chinamen,  come 
flowing  to  Christ,  as  the  long  undulating  clouds  of  pigeons 
darken  along  the  October  sky  in  our  western  forests.  The 
ideal  Church  is  a  loving  Church.  It  loves  men  out  of  their 
sins.  It  seeks  the  poor  and  forlorn,  the  hard-hearted  and 
impenitent,  and  by  unwearied  patience  soothes  their  harsh 
spirit.  Enter  its  gates,  and  you  find  yourself  in  an  atmos- 
phere of  aiFection.  The  strong  bear  the  infirmities  of  the 
weak.  Each  seeks  the  lowest  place  for  himself.  They  love 
to  wash  the  disciples'  feet. 

The  Ideal  Church  is  an  active  Church.  All  the  members 
work  together  for  the  building  up  of  the  body ;  some  after 
this  fashion,  others  after  that.  "'  So  the  whole  body,  fitly 
joined  together,  and  compacted  by  that  which  evexy  joint 
supplieth,"  is  built  up  in  love.  Is  there  any  ruinous  vice, 
any  corroding  sin,  any  festering  moral  disease  in  the  land.? 
The  Ideal  Church  searches  for  its  root,  and  finds  its  cure. 
It  takes  the  intemperate  man  by  the  hand,  and  will  not  let 
him  go  till  he  abstains.  It  penetrates  into  every  haunt  of 
sin  aud  pollution,  and  brings  forth  the  half-ruined  child, 
triumphantly  leads  out  the  corrupt  woman,  and  places  them 


418    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

in  new  homes.  The  Ideal  Church  does  not  dispute  about 
doctrines  or  dogmas.  It  says  to  each,  "  To  your  Master 
you  shall  stand  or  fall,  not  to  me." 

Therefore  the  Ideal  Church  is  an  earthly  heaven.  There 
is  in  it  a  warm,  serene,  sunny  atmosphere ;  a  sky  without 
clouds;  the  society  of  love,  the  solitude  of  meditation,  the 
inaccessible  mountain  tops  of  prayer ;  the  low-lying,  quiet 
valleys,  where  the  wicked  cease  from  troubling,  and  the 
weary  are  at  rest. 

But  where  is  the  Ideal  Church  ?  We  have  seen  that  it  is 
not  in  the  past,  where  many  look  for  it.  The  golden  age  of 
the  Church,  the  Paradisiacal  state  of  Christianity,  is  not  behind 
us.  Was  the  Ideal  Church  that  which  persecuted  Paul  for 
renouncing  Judaism  ?  Was  it  any  of  the  Churches  described 
by  John  in  the  book  of  Revelation  ?  that  of  Ephesus,  which 
had  "  left  its  first  love  "  ?  that  of  Pergamos,  which  contained 
heretical  teachers  ?  that  of  Thyatira,  which  communed  with 
Jezebel  and  the  depths  of  Satan  ?  that  of  Sardis,  which  had 
"  a  name  to  live,  and  was  dead  "  ?  or  that  of  Laodicea,  which 
was  lukewarm? 

Was  that  an  Ideal  Church  where  Paul  was  obliged  to  write 
to  Titus  that  a  bishop  must  not  be  a  striker,  nor  given  to 
wine,  nor  to  filthy  lucre  ?  and  to  advise  Timothy  to  avoid 
"  profane  and  vain  babbling  "  ? 

There  was  more  life  in  it  than  in  the  Church  now  ;  a  great 
struggling,  but  undeveloped  power  of  life,  heaving  and  tossing 
the  Church,  as  with  subterranean  fire  —  smoke  and  flame 
bursting  forth  together ;  a  great  power  of  life,  but  little 
chance  of  doctrine  as  yet ;  little  harmony  of  action  ;  little  in 
accordance  with  our  ideas  of  decency  and  order.  It  was  the 
spriog  time,  and  as  in  the  spring  there  is  a  great  power  of 
life  in  nature,  swelling  all  buds,  pushing  all  shoots,  unfolding 
leaves,  —  but  all  things  still  bare  ;  few  flowers,  no  fruit,  —  so 
it  was  in  the  Primitive  Church.  It  was  not  Ideal.  The 
Ideal  Church  is  before  us,  not  behind  us ;  it  is  to  come. 


THE   CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  419 

§  10.  Tlie  Church  Possible,  or  Church  as  it  can  he.  —  Is 
any  Church  possible  but  the  Actual?  We  think  there  is. 
We  think  that  a  Chui'ch  may  be  something  more  and  better 
than  any  we  have  now.  Without  reaching  the  ideal  stan- 
dard we  can  yet  do  something. 

We  think  it  possible  for  a  Church  to  be  united  on  a  basi-s 
of  study  and  action  ratlier  than  on  that  of  attainment.  In- 
stead of  having  it  consist  of  those  who  have  formed  opinions, 
lot  it  consist  of  those  who  wish  to  form  them.  Instead  of 
having  it  consist  of  those  who  have  been  converted,  and  who 
believe  themselves  pious,  let  it  consist  of  those  who  wish  to 
be  converted,  and  who  desire  to  be  pious.  Instead  of  having 
it  consist  of  good  people,  let  us  invite  in  the  bad  people  who 
desire  to  be  good.  Do  you  send  your  children  to  school 
because  they  are  learned,  and  not  rather  because  they  are 
ignorant?  Why  should  we  not  become  disciples  of  Christ 
because  of  our  ignorance,  rather  than  our  knowledge. 

We  think  it  possible  to  have  a  Church,  and  even  a  denom- 
ination, organized,  not  on  a  creed,  but  on  a  purpose  of  work- 
ing together.  Suppose  that  the  condition  of  membership  was 
the  desire  and  intention  of  getting  good  and  doing  good.  The 
members  of  a  church  are  not  those  who  unite  in  order  to  par- 
take the  Lord's  Supper,  but  to  do  the  Lord's  work.  The  Lord's 
Supper  is  theii*  refreshment  after  working.  They  come  togeth- 
er sometimes  to  remember  his  love,  and  to  get  strength  from 
him.  Let  them  sit  together,  express  their  desires,  confess 
their  faults,  say  what  they  have  been  trying  to  do,  where  they 
have  failed,  Avhere  succeeded,  and  so  encourage  each  other  to 
run  with  diligence  the  race  set  before  them. 

We  therefore  think  it  possible  for  a  Church  to  be  built  ou 
Christ  himself,  and  not  on  a  minister.  The  Church  might 
even  do  without  a  sermon  ;  the  members  might  pray  together 
and  sing  together,  when  they  had  no  minister,  and  be  a  true 
family  of  Christian  men  and  women,  brothers  and  sisters  in 
the  Lord.     The  lowest  view  of  a  Christian  Church  is  that 


420    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

which  makes  it  a  body  of  pew-holders  ;  the  next  lowest,  that 
which  makes  them  an  audience  met  to  hear  a  sermon  ;  the 
next  lowest,  a  mere  congregation  or  assembly  of  worshippers  ; 
a  little  higher  is  that  of  a  body  of  communicants,  bound 
together  by  the  desire  of  knowing  Christ ;  but  highest  of  all 
is  that  which  regards  a  Church  as  the  body  of  Christ.  Such 
a  Church  is  to  learn  of  him,  and  to  do  his  will ;  it  is  his  eyes, 
to  look  on  all  things  with  a  Christian  vision ;  his  hands,  by 
which  he  shall  still  touch  and  heal  the  wretched  ;  his  feet,  to 
go  through  the  world,  to  search  out  its  evils  and  sins ;  his 
mouth,  through  which  he  shall  speak  words  of  divinest  help 
and  encouragement.  "  The  body  of  Christ,  and  members 
one  of  another."  The  body  of  Christ ;  always  active,  always 
progressing,  always  advancing  ;  advancing  into  a  deeper  and 
better  knowledge  of  his  will,  into  a  purer  love  of  his  king- 
dom, into  a  further  and  divine  life  of  union  with  him  ;  the 
body  fitly  joined  together,  and  compacted  by  that  which  every 
joint  supplieth,  making  increase  of  the  body  to  the  building 
of  itself  up  in  love. 

It  is  possible  to  have  a  Church  which  shall  be  ready  to 
teach  and  preach  the  gospel,  not  to  a  few  pew-holders  only, 
but  to  the  whole  community.  Every  child  born  in  New 
England  is  taught  the  elements  of  secular  knowledge  without 
money  and  without  price.  Are  the  waters  of  earthly  knowl- 
edge, then,  so  much  more  essential  to  the  safety  of  the  state 
than  the  waters  of  life,  that  we  cannot  risk  the  chance  of 
leaving  any  child  uninstructed  in  reading  and  writing,  but 
may  leave  him  untaught  in  the  gospel?  It  would  seem 
to  be  possible,  since  we  have  free  schools,  to  have  also  free 
Churches,  and  so  really  to  have,  what  we  profess  to  main- 
tain, Public  Worship  !  There  is  no  such  thing  now  as  pub- 
lic worship.  The  churches  are  not  public  places — each 
belongs  to  a  private  corporation  of  pew-holders. 

It  is  possible  to  have  a  Church  which  shall  consider  it  its 
duty  to  obey  its  Master's  first  command,  and  "  preach  the 


THE  CHRISTIAN   CHURCH.  421 

gospel  to  every  creature."  Its  mission  shall  be  to  go  out  into 
the  highways  and  the  hedges,  to  seek  and  save  the  lost.  It 
will  regard  the  world  as  its  field,  and  the  whole  community 
as  its  sphere  of  labor  — the  whole  community,  according  to 
its  needs,  to  be  taught,  helped,  comforted,  and  cured  by  the 

gospel. 

It  is  possible  to  have  a  Church  which  shall  be  united,  not 
on  ceremonies,  nor  on  a  creed,  but  on  study  and  labor,  on 
loving  and  doing.  The  condition  of  admission  should  be  the 
purpose  to  get  good  and  do  good.  They  should  enter  this 
school  to  learn,  and  not  because  they  were  already  learned  ; 
to  become  good,  and  not  because  they  were  already  so. 

It  is  possible  to  have  a  Church  which  shall  make  it  its  pur- 
pose to  educate  the  whole  man  — spirit,  soul,  and  body ;  and 
not  merely  the  spirit ;  to  present  the  human  being  to  God 
perfect  and  entire,  wanting  nothing. 

It  is  possible  to  have  a  Church  which  shall  combine  union 
and  freedom.  The  Roman  Church,  aiming  at  union,  and 
neglecting  freedom,  has  a  union  which  is  no  real  union  ; 
which  is°an  outward  shell  of  conformity,  without  inward 
unity  of  heart  and  thought.  The  Protestant  Church,  desir- 
ing freedom  and  neglecting  union,  has  a  freedom  which  is 
nol  really  freedom,  being  only  the  outward  liberty  of  tol- 
erated opinions,  but  one  in  which  free  thought  is  discouraged, 
and  honest  difference  of  opinion  disallowed.  Only  by  com- 
bining in  a  living  whole  such  antagonist  needs,  can  either  of 
these  be  fully  secured.  Union  without  freedom  is  not  union  ; 
freedom  without  union,  not  freedom.  There  is  no  harmony 
in  the  juxtaposition  of  similar  notes,  but  in  the  concord  of 
dissimilar  ones.  Difference  without  discord,  variety  in  har- 
mony, the  unity  of  the  spirit  with  diversity  of  the  letter,  dif- 
ference of  operation,  but  the  same  Lord,  many  members,  but 
one  body,  — this  is  very  desirable,  and  wholly  possible. 

The  day  is  coming  in  which  our  dogmatic  Churches,  formal 
Churches,    sentimentally   pious   Churches,    and   professedly 
36 


422    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

liberal  Churches,  shall  be  all  taken  up  into  something  higher 
and  better.  The  very  discontent  which  prevails  everywhere 
announces  it.  It  is  the  working  of  the  leaven  —  mind  agitat- 
ing the  mass.  In  Protestant  countries  there  is  a  tendency 
to  Rome ;  but  in  Roman  Catholic  countries  an  equal  or 
greater  tendency  to  Protestantism.  Orthodoxy  tends  to 
Liberal  Christianity.  Liberal  Christianity  tends  to  Ortho- 
doxy. Each  longs  for  its  opposite,  its  supplement,  its  coun- 
terpart. It  is  a  movement  towards  a  larger  liberty  and  a 
deeper  life. 


THE  TRINITY.  42S 


CHAPTER    XVI. 

THE   TRINITT. 

§1.  Definition  of  the  Church  Doctrine.  —  "The  funda- 
mental formula  for  the  doctrine  of  tlie  Trinity,  as  defined  by 
the  Church,"  says  Twesten,*  "  is,  that  in  one  divine  essence 
or  nature  there  are  three  persons,  distinguished  from  each 
other  by  certain  characteristics,  and  indivisibly  participating 
in  that  one  nature."  The  "  Augsburg  Confession,"  says,  in 
like  maimer,  "three  persons  iu  one  essence." f  So  the 
"  Gallic  Confession,"  and  other  Church  Confessions,  wliich 
say  almost  the  same  thing  in  the  same  words.  | 

The  explanations  given  to  these  phrases  vary  indefinitely. 
Nitzsch  (System  d.  Chi'ist.  Lehre,  §  80)  says,  "  We  stand 
related  in  such  a  way,  with  all  our  Christian  experience 
(Gewerdensein  xmd  Werden),  to  the  one,  eternal,  divine 
essence,  who  is  love,  that  in  the  Son  we  adore  love  as 
mediating  and  speaking,  in  the  spirit  as  fellowship  and  life, 
in  the  Father  as  source  aud  origin."  Schleiermacher  con- 
siders this  doctrine  as  not  any  immediate  expression  of  the 
Christian  consciousness,  and  declares  that  "  our  communion 
with  Christ  might  be  just  the  same  if  we  knew  nothing  at  all 
of  this  transcendent  mystery."  Hase  says,  §  "  This  Church 
dogma  always  has  floated  between  Unitarianism,  Tritheism, 

*  Twesten,  "  Vorlesungen,"  &c.,  vol  ii.,  p.  216.  He  adds  to  this  definition 
its  Latin  form,  in  which  the  words  "  certain  characteristics  "  stand  "  certia 
characteribus  hypostaticis." 

■f  Quoted  by  Schleiermacher,  "  Glaubenslehre,"  §  170. 

X  See  the  full  discussions  of  these  terms  in  Twesten  (as  above),  Hase, 
"  Christl.  Glaubenslehre,"  §  66.  Strauss,  "  Christl.  Glaubenfilehre,"  vol.  L 
Hase,  "  Dogmatik,"  fee. 

§  Dogmatik,  §  2-39. 


424  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

and  Sabellianism,  asserting  the  premises  of  all  three,  and 
denying  their  conclusions  only  by  maintaining  the  opposite." 

All  sorts  of  illustrations  have  been  used  from  the  earliest 
times  —  such  as  fountain,  brook,  river  ;  root,  stalk,  branch  ; 
memory,  understanding,  Avill ;  *  soul,  reason,  sense  ;  -f  three 
persons  in  grammar,  the  teacher,  the  person  spoken  to,  and 
that  spoken  of.  J  Some  mystics  argued  the  necessity  of  three 
persons  in  the  Deity  for  the  sake  of  a  divine  society  and 
mutual  love.  §  Lessing  argues  that  "  God  from  eternity 
must  have  contemplated  that  which  is  most  perfect,  but  that 
is  himself;  but  to  contemplate  with  God,  is  to  create  ;  God's 
thought  of  himself,  therefore,  must  be  a  being,  but  a  divine 
being,  that  is,  God,  the  Son  God ;  but  these  two,  God  the 
thinker  and  God  the  thought,  are  in  perfect  divine  harmony, 
and  this  harmony  is  the  Spirit."  Leibnitz  also  considers  the 
Trinity  as  illustrated  best  by  the  process  of  reflection  in  the 
human  mind.  Strauss  objects  to  this  class  of  definitions, 
that  they  are  two  elements  united  in  a  third,  while  the 
Church  doctrine  requires  three  united  in  a  fourth. 

The  Church  doctrine  concerning  the  Trinity  appears  most 
fully  developed  in  its  Orthodox  form  in  what  is  called  the 
Creed  of  St.  Athanasius.  It  was  not  written  by  him,  but  by 
some  one  in  the  fifth  or  sixth  century. 

*  Augustine  (de  Trinit.),  says,  "One  life  in  man,  but  tliree  faculties — 
memory,  intelligence,  will."    But  how  if  this  is  bad  psychology  ? 

t  Erigena,  "  The  Father  in  the  soul,  the  Son  in  the  reason,  the  Spirit  in  the 
sense  —  this  makes  the  most  luminous  illustration." 

{  Abelard  (quoted  by  Strauss). 

§  Richard  St.  Victor  (quoted  by  Hase),  "  There  can  be  no  possible  com- 
munion of  affection  between  a  less  number  than  three  persons."  So  Augustine, 
"  Cum  aliquid  amo,  tria  sunt  —  ego,  et  qziod  amo,  et  ipse  amor."  Such  illus- 
trations are  hardly  satisfactory  at  the  present  day.  Poiret  says  the  Father  is 
"Deus  a  se,"  the  Son  is  •■'■Deus  ex  se,"  the  Holy  Spirit  "Veus  ad  se  refluens." 
Angelus  Silecius  makes  the  Trinity  a  divine  kiss.  ''  God  kisses  himself  — 
the  Father  kisses,  the  Son  is  kissed,  the  Spirit  is  the  kiss." 

II  Translated  from  the  Latin  in  Hagenbach  (Compend  of  the  History  of 
Doctrines,  vol.  i.  p.  289).  We  agree  with  Strauss,  who  says,  "  FUrwahr,  wer 
das  Symbolum  Quidcwique  beschworen  hatte,  der  hatte  die  Gesetze  dcs  mensch- 
licheu  Dcnkcns  abgeschworen."  So  the  Pastor  Bost  (Le  Protestantisrae 
Liberal),  after  giving  the  Creed,  in  a  somewhat  different  form,  adds,  "  ubl 
insana  faciunt,  mysterium  appellant." 


THE  TRINITY.  425 

1.  Whosoever  will  be  saved,  before  all  things  must  take 
care  to  keep  the  Catholic  fixith : 

2.  Which  except  one  keeps  it  entire  and  inviolate,  he  shall 
without  doubt  perish  everhistiugly. 

3.  But  the  Catholic  faith  is  this :  that  we  adore  oqe  God 
in  Trinity,  and  the  Trinity  in  Unity  ; 

4.  Neither  confounding  the  persons,  nor  dividing  the  sub- 
stance. 

5.  For  there  is  one  person  of  the  Father,  another  of  the 
Son,  and  another  of  the  Holy  Spirit. 

6.  But  the  divinity  of  the  Father,  Son,  and  Spirit,  is  one, 
the  glory  equal,  the  majesty  equal. 

7.  As  is  the  Father,  so  is  the  Son,  and  so  is  the  Holy 
Spirit. 

8.  The  Father  is  uncreated,  the  Son  is  uncreated,  and  the 
Holy  Spirit  uncreated. 

9.  The  Father  immeasurable,*  the  Son  immeasurable,  and 
the  Holy  Spirit  immeasurable. 

10.  The  Father  eternal,  the  Son  eternal,  and  the  Holy 
Spirit  eternal. 

11.  And  yet  there  are  not  three  Eternals,  but  one  Eternal. 

12.  And  so  there  are  not  three  uncreated,  nor  three  im- 
measurable, but  one  uncreated,  and  one  immeasurable. 

13.  So  the  Father  is  omnipotent,  the  Son  is  omnipotent, 
and  the  Holy  Spirit  is  omnipotent. 

14.  And  yet   there   are  not  three  omnipotents,  but   one 
omnipotent. 

1.5.    So  the  Father  is  God,  the  Son  is  God,  and  the  Holy 
Spirit  is  God. 

16.  And  yet  there  are  not  three  Gods,  but  one  God. 

17.  So  the  Father  is  Lord,  the  Son  is  Lord,  and  the  Holy 
Spirit  is  Lord. 

18.  And  yet  there  are  not  three  Lords,  but  one  Lord. 

19     For  as  we  are  compelled  by  Christian  truth  to  confess 

*  "  Incomprehensible,"  Church  of  England  Liturgy 

36* 


426     ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

of  each  one,  that  each  person  *  is  God  and  Loi'd ;  so  we  are 
forbidden  by  the  Catholic  religion  from  saying  three  Gods  or 
three  Lords. 

20.  The  Father  is  not  made,  nor  created,  nor  begotten. 

21.  The  Son  is  from  the  Father  alone;  not  made,  nor 
created,  hut  begotten. 

22.  The  Holy  Spirit  is  from  the  Son  and  the  Father  ;  not 
created,  nor  begotten,  but  proceeding. 

23.  Therefore  there  is  one  Father,  and  not  three ;  one 
Son,  and  not  three  ;  one  Holy  Spirit,  and  not  three. 

24.  And  in  this  Trinity  there  is  none  before  or  after,  none 
greater  or  less,  but  all  three  Persons  are  coeternal  and 
coequal. 

25.  So  that  everywhere  we  must  adore  the  Unity  in 
Trinity,  and  the  Trinity  in  Unity. 

26.  Whoever,  therefore,  would  be  saved,  must  think  thus 
of  the  Trinity. 

§  2.  History  of  the  Doctrine.  —  In  the  Christian  Church, 
the  history  of  this  doctrine  is  interesting  and  important. 
Some  sort  of  Triad,  or  Trinity,  existed  in  very  early  times, 
although  the  Orthodox  form  was  not  established  until  later. 

At  first,  the  prevailing  doctrine  is  that  of  subordination ; 
that  is,  that  the  Son  and  the  Spirit  are  inferior  to  the  Father. 
But,  as  the  Son  and  the  Spirit  were  also  called  divine,  those 
who  thought  thus  were  accused  of  believing  in  three  Gods."}" 
Some  then  said,  that  the  Father  was  alone  divine  ;  and  these 
were  called  Monarchians.  Others,  wishing  to  retain  the 
divinity  of  the  Son  and  Spirit,  and  yet  to  believe  in  one  God, 
said  that  the  divinity  in  the  Father,  in  the  Son,  and  in   the 

*  Or  "  each  person  by  himself."  The  word  in  the  Latin  is  "  Bigillatim,"  a 
word  not  in  most  of  the  dictionaries,  but  in  some  of  them  made  equivalent 
to  "  sing:ulatim." 

t  Tertullian  said,  we  can  call  Christ  "  God"  when  we  speak  of  him  alone; 
but  if  we  mention  him  with  the  Father,  then  we  must  call  the  Father  "  God," 
and  call  Christ  only  "  Lord."  "  For  a  ray  of  light  shining  into  a  room,  we 
may  call  the  sun  shining  there ;  but  if  we  speak  of  the  sun  at  the  same  time, 
then  we  must  distinguish  the  ray,  and  call  it  not  sun,  but  sunbeam." 


THE   TRINITY.  427 

Spirit,  was  essentially  the  same,  but  that  the  divinity  of  the 
Father  was  the  fouutain  from  which  that  of  the  Son  and 
Spirit  was  derived.  Tliis  was  fixed  as  Orthodox  at  tlie 
Council  of  Nice,  A.  D.  325,  and  was  the  beginning  of  Or- 
thodoxy in  the  Church.  It  was  a  middle  course  between 
Scylla  and  Charybdis,  which  were  represented  on  the  one 
side  by  Arius,  who  maintained  that  the  Son  was  created  out 
of  nothing ;  and  by  Sabellius  on  the  other  hand,  who  main- 
tained that  the  Sou  was  only  a  mode,  manifestation,  or  name 
of  God  ;  God  being  called  the  Father,  as  Creator  of  the 
world ;  called  Son,  as  Redeemer  of  the  world ;  and  Spirit, 
as  Sanctifier  of  the  world.  The  Council  of  Nice  declared 
that  the  Son  was  not  a  manifestation  of  God,  as  Sabellius 
said,  nor  a  creation  by  God,  as  Arius  said,  but  a  deriva- 
tion from  God.*  Just  as  the  essence  of  the  fountain  flows 
into  the  stream  derived  from  it,  so  the  essence  of  the  Father 
flows  into  the  Son,  who  is  derived  from  him.  Here,  then, 
we  have  the  three  formulas  of  the  early  Church  —  that  of 
Arius,  who  says,  "  The  Son  was  created  by  the  Father,  and 
is  inferior  to  him  ;  "  that  of  Sabellius,  who  says,  •■'  The 
Father,  Son,  and  Spirit,  are  manifestations  of  God,  and  the 
same  essence  ;  "  and  Orthodoxy,  as  the  Council  of  Nice, 
trying  to  stand  between  them,  and  saying,  "  The  Son  is 
derived  from  the  Father,  and  is  of  the  same  essence  with 
him." 

*  The  decrees  of  the  Council  of  Nice  inclined  to  Sabellianism.  The  term 
bfiuuiaioi  {of  the  same  essence)  was  a  Sabellian  term.  Sabellianism  could,  in 
fact,  stand  most  of  the  tests  of  modern  Orthodoxy,  since  it  maintains  three 
persons  and  one  essence,  fiiav  v-anarauiv  and  t//i«  :ri>i'ia(,nra  ;  and  Sclilcicrmachcr, 
in  one  of  his  most  elaborate  treatises  (Ueber  den  Gegensatz  zwischcn  dor 
Sabellianisi^hen  und  der  Athanasianischen  Vorstellung  von  dcr  Trlnitat. 
Theolog.  Zoitschritt.  Berlin,  1822),  has  sought  to  rehabilitate  Sabellianism. 
Moses  Stuart  translated  this  treatise,  and  plainly  advocated  a  similar  view. 
Base  (Kirchengeschichte,  §  91)  defines  the  view  of  Sabellius  as  making 
"  Father,  Son,  and  Spirit  the  difl'erent  forms  of  revelation  of  the  Supreme  Unity 
unfolding  itself  in  the  world-history  as  the  Triad."  Perhaps  (see  Baur) 
the  chief  peculiarity  of  Sabellius  is  in  making  the  Triad  begin  and  end  with 
the  process  of  revelation.  The  Monad  is  God  in  himself:  the  Triad  is  God  in 
the  process  of  self-revelation  (Baur,  "Christliche  Lehre  von  dor  Urcicinigkeit," 
and  "  Lehrbuch  der  Christlicheu  Dogmengeschichte  "). 


428         orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

The  Church,  ever  since,  has  been  like  a  ship  beating 
against  head  winds  between  opposing  shores.  It  has  stood 
on  one  tack  to  avoid  Arianism  or  Tritheism,  till  it  finds 
itself  running  into  Sabellianism ;  then  it  goes  about,  and 
stands  away  till  it  comes  near  Arianism  or  Tritheism  again. 
Unitarianism  is  on  both  sides  :  on  one  side  in  the  farm  ot  one 
God,  with  a  threefold  manifestation  of  himself ;  on  the  other 
side  in  the  form  of  a  Supreme  God,  with  the  Son  and  Spirit 
subordinate.  It  has  always  been  very  hard  to  be  Orthodox ; 
for,  to  do  so,  one  must  distinguish  the  Persons,  and  yet  not 
divide  the  substance,  of  the  Deity.  In  keeping  the  three 
Persons  distinctly  separate,  there  was  great  danger  of  mak- 
ing three  distinct  Gods.  On  the  other  hand,  if  one  tried  to 
make  the  Unity  distinct,  there  was  danger  that  the  Persons 
would  grow  shadowy,  and  disappear. 

The  heaviest  charge  against  the  Church  doctrine  of  the 
Trinity  is,  that,  driven  to  despair  by  these  difficulties,  it  has 
at  last  made  Orthodoxy  consist,  not  in  any  sound  belief,  but 
only  in  sound  phrases.  It  is  not  believing  anything,  but 
saying  something,  which  now  makes  a  man  Orthodox.  If 
you  will  only  use  the  word  "  Trinity  "  in  any  sense,  if  you 
will  only  call  Christ  God  in  any  sense,  you  are  Orthodox. 

§  3.  Errors  in  the  Church  Doctrine  of  the  Trinity.  —  The 
errors  in  the  popular  view  concerning  the  Trinity,  as  it  is  at 
present  held,  appear  to  be  these  :  — 

1.  The  Trinity  is  held  as  a  mere  dogma,  or  form  of  words, 
not  as  a  reality.  It  is  held  in  the  letter,  not  in  the  spirit. 
There  is  no  power  in  it,  nor  life  in  it ;  and  it  is  in  no  sense 
an  object  of  faith  to  those  Avho  accept  it.  They  do  not 
believe  it,  but  rather  believe  that  they  ought  to  believe  it. 
There  are  certain  texts  in  Scripture  which  seem  to  assert  it, 
certain  elaborate  arguments  which  appear  convincing  and 
irrefutable.  On  the  strength  of  these  texts  and  these  argu- 
ments, they  believe  that  they  ought  to  believe  it.  But  it  is  a 
matter  of  conscience,  not  of  heart ;  of  logic,  not  of  life ;  of 


THE  TRINITY.  429 

law,  not  of  love.  It  is  not  held  as  a  Christian  doctrine  ought 
to  be  held,  with  the  heart ;  but  only  philosophically,  with  the 
head.  If  it  should  cease  to  be  preached  for  a  few  years  in 
Orthodox  pulpits,  it  would  cease  to  be  believed ;  it  would 
drop  out  of  the  faith,  or  rather  out  of  the  creed,  of  the  com- 
munity. Unitarianism  has  extended  itself,  -without  being 
preached,  from  the  simple  reading  of  the  Bible.  But  Trini- 
tarianism  cannot  be  trusted  to  its  own  power.  It  has  no 
hold  on  riie  heai-t.  Here,  in  Massachusetts,  the  ministers 
left  off  preaching  the  Trinity,  and  tlie  consequence  was,  that 
the  people  became  Unitarian.  Unitarianism  in  New  England 
was  not  diffused  by  preaching :  it  came  of  itself,  as  soon  as 
the  clergy  left  off  preaching  the  Trinity.  This  shows  how 
worthless,  empty,  and  soulless  the  doctrine  was  and  is. 
Instead  of  this  formal  doctrine,  we  want  something  vital. 

2.  Another  objection  to  the  fresent  form  of  the  Trinity  is, 
that  it  is  not  only  scholastic,  or  purely  intellectual,  but  that  it 
is  also  negative.  It  is  not  even  a  positive  doctrine.  It  is 
often  charged  against  Unitarianism,  that  it  is  a  mere  nega- 
tion ;  and,  in  one  sense,  the  charge  is  well  founded.  Uni- 
tarianism is  a  negation,  so  far  as  it  is  a  mere  piece  of  reason- 
ing against  Orthodoxy  ;  but,  as  asserting  the  divine  Unity, 
it  is  very  positive.  But  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  is  a  mere 
negation,  as  it  is  usually  held ;  because  it  is  an  empty  form 
of  denial.  It  only  can  be  delined  or  expressed  negatively. 
The  three  Persons  are  not  substances,  on  the  one  hand ;  nor 
qualities,  on  the  other  hand.  It  is  not  Sabellianism,  nor  is 
it  Arianism.  Every  term  connected  with  the  Trinity  has 
been  selected,  not  to  express  a  truth,  but  to  avoid  an  error. 
The  term  "  one  essence "  was  chosen  in  order  to  exclude 
Arianism  ;  the  term  "  three  Persons,"  or  subsistences,  was 
chosen  in  order  to  avoid  Sabellianism. 

Because  the  doctrine  is  thus  a  negation,  it  has  failed  of  its 
chief  use.  It  has  become  exclusive  ;  whereas,  when  stated 
truly,  as  a  positive  truth,  it  would  become  inclusive.    Rightly 


430     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

stated,  it  would  bind  together  all  true  religion  in  one  har- 
monious whole,  comprehending  in  its  universal  sweep  every- 
thing true  in  natural  religion,  everything  true  in  reason,  and 
uniting  them  in  vital  union,  without  discord  and  without 
confusion.  Every  manifestation  which  God  has  made  of 
himself  in  nature,  in  Christ,  and  in  the  human  soul,  would 
be  accepted  and  vitally  recognized  by  Christianity,  which 
comes,  not  to  destroy,  but  to  fulfil.  The  doctrine  of  the 
Trinity  would  be  the  highest  form  of  reconciliation -or  atone- 
ment, —  reconciling  all  varieties  in  one  great  harmony  ;  rec- 
onciling the  natural  and  supernatural,  law  and  grace,  time 
and  eternity,  fate  and  freedom. 

But,  before  illustrating  this,  we  must  consider  further 
some  of  the  objections  to  the  common  form  of  the  doctrine. 

3.  It  is  also  charged  against  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity, 
"  that  it  is  a  contradiction  in  terms,  and  therefore  essentially 
incredible."  To  this  it  is  replied,  that  it  would  be  a  contra- 
diction if  God  were  called  Three  in  the  same  sense  in  which 
he  is  called  One ;  but  not  otherwise.  The  answer  is  per- 
fectly satisfactory  ;  and  we  therefore  proceed  to  ask.  In  what 
sense  is  he  called  Three,  and  in  what  sense  is  he  called  One  ? 
The  answer  is.  The  Unity  is  of  essence,  or  substance :  the 
Trinity  is  of  persons.  This  answer,  again,  is  satisfactory, 
provided  we  know  what  is  meant  by  these  two  terras.  But 
the  difficulty  is  to  know  what  is  meant  by  the  word 
"person."  We  are  expressly  informed,  that  this  term  is 
not  used  in  its  usual  sense  ;  for,  if  it  wei-e,  it  would  divide 
the  essence,  and  three  Persons  would  be  the  same  as  three 
Gods.  On  the  other  hand,  we  are  told  that  it  means  more 
than  the  three  characters  or  manifestations.  Here  lies  the 
difficulty,  and  the  whole  of  the  rational  difficulty,  in  the 
doctrine  of  the  Trinity.  It  is  all  on  the  side  of  the  Triad. 
When  we  ask.  What  do  you  mean  by  "  the  three"?  there 
can  be  given  but  three  answers,  —  two  of  them  distinct,  and 
one  indistinct.     These   ansv/ers  are,   (1.)  We  mean   three 


THE   TRINITY.  431 

somethings,  which  wc  canuot  define  ;  (2.)  "We  mean  Ihrco 
Persons,  like  Peter,  James,  and  John  ;  (3.)  We  mean  three 
manifestations,  characters,  or  modes  of  being.  Let  us  con- 
sider these  three  answers. 

(a.)  "  The  three  Persons  are  three  somethings,  which 
canuot  be  defined.  It  is  a  mystery.  It  is  above  reason. 
There  is  mystery  in  everything,  and  there  must  be  mystery 
in  the  Deity."  So  Augustine  said,  long  ago,  "  We  say 
three  Persons,  not  because  we  have  anything  to  say,  but 
because  wc  want  to  say  something."  *  But  if  one  uses  the 
phrase  "  three  Persons,"  and  refuses  to  define  it  positively, 
merely  defining  it  negatively,  saying,  "  It  does  not  mean 
this,  and  it  does  not  mean  that,  and  I  don't  know  what  it 
does  mean,"  he  avoids,  it  is  true,  the  difficulties,  and  escapes 
the  objections ;  but  he  does  it  by  giving  up  the  article  of 
faith.  No  one  can  deny  that  there  may  he  three  unknown 
distinctions  in  the  divine  nature  ;  but  no  one  can  be  asked  to 
believe  in  them,  till  he  is  told  what  they  are.  To  say, 
therefore,  that  the  Trinity  is  a  mystery,  is  to  abandon  it  as 
an  article  of  faith,  and  make  of  it  only  a  subject  of  specula- 
tion. We  avoid  the  contradiction ;  but  we  do  it  by  re- 
linquishing the  doctrine. 

This  fact  is  not  sufliciently  considered  by  Ti'initarians. 
They  first  demand  of  us  to  believe  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity, 
and,  when  pressed  to  state  distinctly  the  doctrine,  retire  into 
the  protection  of  mystery,  and  decline  giving  any  distinct 
account  of  it.  Now,  no  human  being  e'.er  denied  the  ex- 
istence of  mysteries  connected  \vith  God,  and  nature,  and  all 
life.  To  assure  us,  therefore,  that  such  mysteries  exist,  is 
slightly  superfluous.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  no  hmnan 
being  ever  believed,  or  could  believe,  a  mystery,  any  more 
than  he  could  see  anything  invisible  or  hear  anything  in- 
audible. To  believe  a  doctrine,  the  first  condition  is,  that  all 
its  terms  shall  be  distinct  and  intelligible. 

•  "  Dictum  est  tamen  tres  personoe,  non  ut  illud  diceretur,  sed  ut  no  tace- 
petnr."    Aug.  de  Trin.,  quoted  by  Hase,  Do?.  §  238. 


432    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

(6.)  The  secoud  answer  to  the  question  is,  "  We  mean,  by 
Persons,  three  Persons,  like  Peter,  James,  and  John."  Ac- 
cording to  this  answer,  the  Trinity  remains,  but  the  Unity 
disappears.  This  answer  leaves  the  Persons  distinct,  but  the 
Unity  indistinct.  The  Persons  are  not  confounded  ;  but  the 
essence  is  divided.  The  Tri-personality  is  maintained,  but 
at  the  expense  of  the  Unity.  In  fact,  this  answer  gives  us 
Tritheism,  or  three  Gods,  whose  unity  is  only  an  entire 
agreement  of  feeling  and  action.  But  this  answer  we  may 
set  aside  as  unorthodox,  no  less  than  unscriptural. 

(c.)  Having  thus  disposed  of  each  other  possible  answer, 
there  remains  only  that  which  makes  of  the  three  Persons 
three  revelations  or  manifestations  of  Grod,  or  representations 
of  Grod.  This  answer  avoids  all  the  difficulties.  It  avoids 
that  of  contradiction ;  as  Ave  do  not  say  that  God  is  one  in 
the  same  sense  in  which  he  is  three,  but  in  a  diflerent  sense. 
It  avoids  the  objection  of  ohscurity  ;  for  it  is  a  distinct  state- 
ment. It  avoids  the  objection  of  Tritheism ;  for  it  leaves 
the  Unity  untouched.  Moreover,  it  is  a  real  Trinity,  and 
not  merely  nominal.  The  Father,  the  Son,  and  the  Holy 
Ghost  are  not  merely  three  different  names  for  the  same 
thing,  but  they  indicate  three  different  revelations,  three 
different  views  which  God  has  given  of  his  character,  which, 
taken  together,  constitute  the  total  divine  representation.  It 
remains,  therefore,  simply  to  ask.  Is  this  view  a  true  one  ? 
Is  there  any  foundation  for  it  in  Scripture,  in  reason,  and  in 
Christian  consciousness,  the  three  sources  of  our  knowledge 
of  the  truth  ? 

§  4.  The  Trinity  of  Manifestations  foundedin  the  Truth  of 
Things.  —  We  repeat,  that  this  view  is  an  Orthodox  view  of 
the  Trinity,  according  to  the  teaching  of  the  greatest  fathers 
of  the  Church.  If  we  suppose  that  the  Deity  has  made,  and 
is  evermore  making,  three  distinct  and  independent  revela- 
tions of  himself,  —  each  re\^lation  giving  a  different  view  of 
the  divine  Being,  each  revelation  showing  God  to  man  under 


THE  TRINITT,  433 

a  different  aspect,  —  then  each  of  these  is  a  personal  mani- 
festation. Each  reveals  God  as  a  Person.  If  we  see  God, 
for  example,  in  nature,  we  see  him  not  merely  as  a  power,  a 
supreme  cause,  but  also  a  living  Person,  who  creates  ever- 
more out  of  a  fulness  of  divine  wisdom  and  love.  God  in 
nature  is,  then,  a  Person.  Again  :  if  God  reveals  himself  in 
Christ,  it  is  not  as  abstract  truth  or  as  doctrinal  statement. 
But  we  see  God  himself,  the  personal  God,  the  Father  and 
Friend,  the  redeeming  grace,  the  God  who  loved  us  before 
the  foundation  of  the  world,  approaching  us  in  Christ  to 
reconcile  us  and  save  us.  It  is  a  God  who  "  so  loved  the 
world  "  that  we  see  in  Christ,  therefore,  a  Person.  And  so 
the  Spirit,  which  speaks  in  the  human  conscience  and  human 
heart,  is  not  a  mere  influence,  or  rapture,  or  movement,  but  is 
one  who  communes  with  us ;  one  who  talks  with  us ;  one 
who  comforts  us  ;  one  who  hears  and  answers  us  ;  therefore 
a  Person. 

If,  then,  there  is  no  antecedent  objection  to  this  form  of 
the  Trinity  as  a  threefold  manifestation  of  the  divine  Being, 
we  have  only  to  ask.  Is  it  true  as  a  matter  of  fact?     Has 
such  a  threefold  manifestation  of  God  actually  taken  place  ? 
We  reply,  that  it  is  so.    According  to  Scripture,  observation, 
and  experience,  we  find  such  to  be  the  fact.    Scripture  shows 
us  God,  the  Father,  as  the  source  of  all  being,  the  fountain  ■. 
and  end  of  all  things  ;  from  whom  all  things  have  come,  and 
to  whom  all  things  tend.     As  the  Creator,  he  reveals  himself  ^ 
in  nature    and   providence    (as  the  apostle  Paul  declares) 
"  being  understood  by  the  things  that  are  made,"  and  "  not 
leaving  himself  without  a  witness." 

Supreme  power,  wisdom,  and  goodness  are  manifested  in 
naturo  as  unchanging  law,  as  perfect  order.  But  God  is 
seen  in  Christ  again  as  Redeemer,  as  meeting  the  exigencies 
arisjjg  from  the  freedom  of  the  creature  by  what  we  call 
miracle  ;  not  contrary  to  nature,  but  different  from  nature, 
showiug  himself  as  the  Friend  and  Helper  of  the  soul.  As 
37 


434  ORTHODOXY  :    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

the  essence  of  the  first  revelation  of  God  is  the  sight  of  hi3 
goodness,  and  wisdom,  and  power,  displayed  in  law,  so  the 
essence  of  the  second  revelation  is  of  the  same  essential 
Being  displaying  himself  as  love.  In  the  first  revelation,  he 
is  the  universal  Parent ;  in  the  second,  he  is  the  personal 
Friend.  But  there  is  a  third  revelation  which  God  makes  of 
himself,  —  within  the  soul  as  life.  The  same  power,  wisdom, 
and  goodness  which  we  see  displayed  externally  in  outward 
nature,  we  find  manifested  internally  in  the  soul  itself,  as  its 
natural  and  its  spiritual  life.  That  which  is  displayed  out- 
wardly as  power  is  manifested  within  the  soul  as  cause  ;  that 
which  is  manifested  outwardly  as  wisdom  is  revealed  in- 
wardly as  reason  ;  and  that  Avhich  is  manifested  outwardly 
as  goodness  is  manifested  inwardly  as  conscience,  or  the  law 
of  right. 

§  5.    It  is  in  Harmony  with  Scripture. —  The  Scriptures 

also  speak  of  the  Father,  the   Son,  and  the  Holy  Ghost. 

When  they  speak  of  the  Father,  they  usually  mean  God  as 

the  Supreme  Being.     Matt.  11 :  25  :  "  Jesus  said,  I  thank 

thee,  0  Father.,  Lord  of  heaven  and  earth."     As  omniscient : 

"  Of  that  day  knoweth  no  man,  nor  the  angels,  nor  the  Son, 

but  the  Father  only."     As  omnipotent :  "  Abba,  Father,  all 

,    things  are  possible  to  thee."     As  having  life  in  himself,  and 

t;  as  spirit:  "They  shall  worship  the  Father  in  spirit  and  in 

re  trutli."     As  the  source  of  all  power,  life,  and  authority  of  the 

Is  Son:  "I  came  forth  o/ i/ie  Father;"  '■'■the  Father,   which 

Clniath  sent  me  ;  "  "  the  works  which  the  Father  hath  given  me 

o<to  do."     The   apostle  Paul  says,  "To  us  there  is  but  one 

God,  the  Father ; "  and  calls  him  "  the  God  of  our  Lord 

Jesus  ; "  also  "  the  one  God  and  Father  of  all,  who  is  above 

all,  and  through  all,  and  in  us  all."     The  great  order  of  the 

universe  depends  on  him :   "  He  has  put  the  times  and  the 

seasons  in  his  own  power."     Christ  will  at  last  "  deliver  up 

the  kingdom  to  God,  the  Father."     By  Christ,  "  we  have 

access   in   one    spirit   to    the   Father."      "  All   things    were 


THE   TRINITY.  435 

delivered"  to  Christ  "of  his  Father,"  \phose  will  Chrisf 
always  sought.  Thus  is  the  Father  spoken  of  in  the  New 
Testament  as  the  Source  from  Avhich  all  things  have  pro- 
ceeded, and  the  End  to  whom  all  things  tend. 

The  So7i  (or  Son  of  God)  is  spoken  of  in  the  New  Testa- 
ment as  distinct  l;-om  the  Father,  but  intimately  united 
with  him.  The  Father  gives  power ;  the  Son  receives 
it.  The  Father  gives  light ;  the  Son  receives  it.  The 
Son  does  nothing  but  what  he  seeth  the  Father  do.  "  The 
Father  hath  sent  me,"  he  says,  "  and  I  live  by  the  Father." 
"  I  am  not  alone ;  but  I,  and  the  Father  who  sent  me." 
"  The  Son  is  in  the  Father,  and  the  Father  in  him."  "  No 
man  cometh  to  the  Father  but  by "  him.  He  shows  the 
Father  to  the  world.  The  Father  is  glorified  in  the  Son. 
He  is  in  the  bosom  of  the  Father.  The  Father  sent  him 
to  be  the  Saviour  of  the  world.  "  He  that  hath  the  Son 
hath  life  ;  "  "And  in  him  is  everlasting  life." 

The  Holy  Spirit,  Avhich  came  after  Jesus  left  the  world 
(also  called  the  Holy  Ghost  and  the  Spirit  of  God),  is  an 
inward  revelation  of  God  and  of  Christ.  It  teaches  all 
things,  comforts,  convinces.  It  is  a  spirit  of  life,  lifts  one 
above  the  flesh,  makes  one  feel  that  he  is  a  Son  of  God, 
communicates  a  variety  of  gifts,  produces  unity  in  the 
Church,  sanctifies,  sheds  the  love  of  God  into  the  heart,  and 
renews  the  soul.  The  New  Testament  speaks  of  joy  in  the 
Holy  Ghost,  power  of  the  Holy  Ghost,  and  communion  of 
the  Holy  Ghost. 

According  to  the  New  Testament,  the  Father  would  seem 
to  be  the  Source  of  all  things,  the  Creator,  the  Fountain  of 
being  and  of  life.  The  Son  is  spoken  of  as  the  manifestation 
of  that  Being  in  Jesus  .Christ ;  and  the  Holy  Ghost  is  spoken 
of  as  a  spiritual  influence,  proceeding  from  the  Father  and 
the  Son,  dwelling  in  the  hearts  of  believers,  as  the  source  of 
their  life, — the  idea  of  God  seen  in  causation,  in  reason, 
and  in  conscience,  as  making  the  very  life  of  the  soul  itself. 


436    oethodoxy:  its  teuths  and  errors. 

There  are  these  three  revelations  of  God,  and  we  know 
of  no  others.  They  are  distinct  from  each  other  in  form, 
but  the  same  in  essence.  They  are  not  merely  three  names 
for  the  same  thing  ;  but  they  are  real  personal  manifestations 
of  God,  real  subsistences,  since  he  is  personally  present  in  all 
of  them.  This  view  avoids  all  heresies,  since  it  neither 
"  divides  the  substance"  nor  "  confounds  the  persons."  And 
these  are  really  the  two  heresies,  which  are  the  most  com- 
mon and  the  most  to  be  avoided.  We  think  it  can  be 
easily  shown  that  these  are  the  great  practical  dangers  to  be 
avoided.  To  "  divide  the  substance  "  is  so  to  separate  the 
revelations  of  God  as  to  make  them  contradict  or  oppose 
each  other :  to  "  confound  the  persons  "  is  not  to  recognize 
each  as  an  independent  source  of  truth  to  the  soul. 

§  6.  Practical  value  of  the  Trinity,  when  rightly  under- 
stood. —  There  is,  therefore,  an  essential  truth  hidden  in  the 
idea  of  the  Trinity.  While  the  Church  doctrine,  in  every 
form  which  it  has  hitherto  taken,  has  failed  to  satisfy  the 
human  intellect,  the  Christian  heart  has  clung  to  the  sub- 
stance contained  in  them  all.  Let  us  endeavo$.^to  see  what 
is  the  practical  value  of  this  doctrine,  for  the  sake  of  which 
its  errors  of  statement  have  been  pardoned.  What  does  it 
say  to  the  Christian  consciousness  ? 

The  Trinity,  truly  apprehended,  teaches,  by  its  doctrine 
of  Tri-personality,  that  God  is  immanent  in  nature,  in  Christ, 
and  in  the  soul.  It  teaches  that  God  is  not  outside  of  the 
world,  making  it  as  an  artisan  makes  a  machine  ;  nor  outside 
of  Christ,  sending  him,  and  giving  to  him  miraculous  powers  ; 
nor  outside  of  the  soul,  touching  it  ah  extra  from  time  to 
time  with  unnatural  influences,  revolutionizing  and  overturn- 
ing it ;  but  that  he  is  personally  present  in  each  and  all.  So 
that,  when  we  study  the  mysteries  and  laws  of  nature,  we 
are  drawing  near  to  God  himself,  and  looking  into  his  face. 
When  we  see  Christ,  we  see  God,  who  is  in  Christ ;  and 
when  we  look  into  the  solemn  intuitions  of  our  soul,  the 


THE  TRINITY.  437 

monitions  of  conscience,  and  the  influences  which  draw  our 
heart  to  goodness,  we  are  meeting  and  communing  with  God. 

Moreover,  the  Trinity,  truly  apprehended,  teaches,  by  its 
doctrine  of  One  Substance  (the  Homoousion),  that  these 
three  revelations,  though  distinct,  are  essentially  at  one  ; 
that  nature  cannot  contradict  revelation ;  that  revelation 
cannot  contradict  nature  ;  and  that  the  intuitions  of  the  soul 
cannot  be  in  conflict  with  either.  Hence  it  teaches  that  the 
Naturalist  need  not  fear  revelation ;  nor  the  Christian 
believer,  natural  Theism.  Since  it  is  one  and  the  same  God 
who  dwells  in  nature,  in  Christ,  and  in  the  soul,  all  his 
revelations  must  be  in  harmony  with  each  other.  To  sup- 
pose otherwise  is  to  "divide  the  substance"  of  the  Trinity. 

And  again :  the  Trinity,  rightly  understood,  asserts  the 
distinctness  of  these  three  personal  revelations.  It  is  the 
same  God  who  speaks  in  each ;  but  he  says  something  new 
each  time.  He  reveals  a  new  form  of  his  being.  He  shows 
us,  not  the  same  order  and  aspect  of  truth  in  each  manifesta- 
tion, but  wholly  different  aspects. 

And  yet  again :  as  the  doctrine  teaches  that  the  Son.  is 
begotten  of  the  Father,  and  the  Spirit  proceeds  from  the 
Father  and  Son,  it  thereby  shows  how  the  revelation  in 
nature  prepares  for  the  revelation  in  Christ,  and  both  for  the 
revelation  in  the  soul. 

The  error  of  "dividing  the  substance"  is  perhaps  the 
most  common.  The  man  who  sees  God  in  nature,  sees  him 
only  there  :  therefore  God  loses  to  him  that  personal  char- 
acter which  seems  especially  to  be  seen  through  Christ ;  lor 
God,  as  a  person,  comes  to  us  most  in  Christ,  and  then  is 
recognized  also  in  nature  and  the  soul  as  a  personal  being. 
So,  without  Christ,  natural  religion  is  cold  :  it  wants  love  ; 
it  wants  life.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  the  Christian  believer 
who  avoids  seeing  God  in  nature,  and  who  finds  him  only  in 
his  Bible,  loses  the  sense  of  law  or  order,  of  harmonious 
growth,  and  becomes  literal,  dogmatic,  and  narrow.  And 
37* 


438    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

so,  too,  the  mystic,  believing  only  in  God's  revelation 
through  the  soul,  and  not  going  to  nature  or  to  Christ, 
becomes  withdraw^n  from  life,  and  has  a  morbid  and  ghastly 
religion,  and,  having  no  test  by  which  to  judge  his  inw^ard 
revelations,  may  become  the  prey  of  all  fantasies  and  all  evil 
spirits,  lying  spirits,  foul  spirits,  and  cruel  spirits. 

Such  errors  come  from  "  dividing  the  substance  ; "  and 
they  are  only  too  common.  So  that,  when  the  true  doctrine 
of  Trinity  in  Unity  is  apprehended,  the  most  beneficial 
results  may  be  expected  to  flow  into  the  life  of  the  Church. 
No  longer  believed  as  a  dead  formula,  no  longer  held  in  the 
letter  which  killeth,  no  longer  accepted  outwardly  as  a  dogma 
or  authority,  but  seen,  felt,  and  realized  in  the  daily  activity 
of  the  intellect  and  heart,  the  whole  Church  will  recover  its 
lost  union,  sects  will  disappear,  and  the  old  feud  between 
science  and  religion  forever  cease.  Science  will  become 
religious,  and  religion  scientific.  Science,  no  longer  cold 
and  dead,  but  filled  through  and  through  with  the  life  of 
God,  will  reach  its  hand  to  Christianity.  Piety,  no  longer 
an  outlaw  from  nature,  no  longer  exiled  from  life  into 
churches  and  monasteries,  will  inform  and  animate  all  parts 
of  human  daily  action.  Christianity,  no  longer  narrow, 
Jewish,  bigoted,  formal,  but  animated  by  the  great  liberty 
of  a  common  life,  will  march  onward  to  conquer  all  forms 
of  error  and  evil  in  the  omnipotence  of  universal  and  har- 
monious truth. 

Natural  religion,  Christianity,  and  spii'itual  piety,  being 
thus  harmonized,  nature  will  be  more  warm,  Christ  more 
human,  and  the  divine  influences  in  the  soul  more  uniform 
and  constant.  Nature  will  be  full  of  God,  with  a  sense  of 
his  presence  penetrating  it  everywhere.  Christianity  will 
become  more  natural,  and  all  its  great  facts  assume  the  pro- 
portion of  laws,  universal  as  the  universe  itself.  Divine  in- 
fluences will  cease  to  be  spasmodic  and  irregular,  and  become 
calm,  serene,  and  pure,  an  indwelling  life  of  God  in  the  soul. 


THE  TRINITY.  439 

A  simple  Unity,  as  held  by  the  Jews  and  Mohammedans, 
and  by  some  Christian  Unitarians,  may  be  a  bald  Unity  and 
an  empty  Unity.  Then  it  shows  us  one  God,  but  God 
withdrawn  from  nature,  from  Christ,  from  the  soul ;  not 
immanent  in  any,  but  outside  of  them.  It  leaves  nature 
godless ;  leaves  Christ  merely  human ;  leaves  the  soul  a 
machine  to  be  moved  by  an  external  impulse,  not  an  inward 
inspiration.* 

We  conclude,  finally,  that  no  doctrine  of  Orthodoxy  is  so 
false  in  its  form,  and  so  true  in  its  substance,  as  this.  There 
is  none  so  untenable  as  dogma,  but  none  so  indispensable  as 
experience  and  life.  The  Trinity,  truly  received,  would 
harmonize  science,  faith,  and  vital  piety.  The  Trinity,  as 
it  now  stands  in  the  belief  of  Christendom,  at  once  confuses 
the  mind,  and  leaves  it  empty.  It  feeds  us  with  chaff,  with 
empty  phrases  and  forms,  with  no  real  inflowing  convictions. 
It  seems  to  lie  like  a  vessel  on  the  shore,  of  no  use  where  it 
is,  yet  difficult  to  remove  and  get  afloat ;  but  when  the  tide 
rises,  and  the  vessel  floats,  it  will  be  able  to  bear  to  and  fro 
the  knowledge  of  mankind,  and  unite  various  convictions  in 
living  harmony.  It  is  there  for  something.  It  is  providen- 
tially allowed  to  remain  in  the  creeds  of  the  Chunch  for 
something.  It  has  in  itself  the  seed  of  a  ^;rand  future  ;  and, 
though  utterly  false  and  empty  as  it  is  taught  and  defended, 
it  is  kept  by  the  deeper  instinct  of  the  Christian  conscious- 
ness, like  the  Christ  in  his  tomb,  waiting  for  the  resurrec- 
tion. 

*  John  of  Damascus  (quoted  by  Twesten)  made  his  boast  of  Christianity, 
that  it  united  what  was  true  is  Polytheism  with  what  was  true  in  Judaism. 
"  From  the  Jews,"  he  says,  "  we  have  the  oneness  of  nature,  from  the  Greeks 
the  distinction  in  hypostases." 


APPENDIX. 


CRITICAL    NOTICES. 

In  this  Appendix  we  shall  add  a  brief  critical  examina- 
tion of  certain  recent  works  on  points  connected  with  our 
previous  subjects.  These  criticisms  will  complete  the  dis- 
cussion in  these  various  directions,  so  far  as  space  will  allow 
here.  The  largest  part  of  what  follows  has  been  printed 
already,  either  in  the  "  Christian  Examiner,"  or  in  the 
"  Monthly  Journal  of  the  American  Unitarian  Association." 

§  1.  On  the  Defence  of  Nescience  in  TJieology,  by  Herbert  Spen- 
cer and  Henry  L.  Mansel.  —  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer,  in  his  book 
called  "  Fii-st  Principles,"  lays  down  the  doctrine  of  theological 
nescience,  as  the  final  result  of  religious  inquirj'.  In  his  chapter 
on  "  Ultimate  ReUgious  Ideas "  he  argues  thus :  The  religious 
problem  is.  Whence  comes  the  universe  ?  In  answer  to  this  ques- 
tion only  three  statements  are  possible.  It  is  self-existent.  It  was 
self-created.  It  was  created  by  external  agency.  Now,  none  of 
these,  says  Spencer,  is  tenable.  For,  (1.)  Self-existence  means 
simply  an  existence  without  a  beginning,  and  it  is  not  possible  to 
conceive  of  this.  The  conception  of  infinite  past  time  is  an  im- 
possibility, (2.)  Self-creation  is  Pantheism.  We  can  conceive, 
somewhat,  of  self-evolution,  but  not  of  a  potential  universe  pass- 
ing into  an  actual  one.  (3.)  The  theistic  hypothesis  is  equally  in- 
conceivable. Foi:  '.bis  is  to  suppose  the  world  made  as  a  workman 
makes  a  piece  of  'orniture.     W^e  can  conceive  of  this  last,  because 


442    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

the  workman  has  the  material  given  ;  he  only  adds  form  to  the  sub- 
stance. To  produc6  matter  out  of  nothing  is  the  real  difficulty. 
No  simile  enables  us  to  conceive  of  this  production  of  matter  out 
of  nothing.  Again,  says  Spencer,  space  is  something,  the  non- 
existence of  which  is  inconceivable ;  hence  the  creation  of  space  is 
inconceivable.  And  lastly,  says  Spencer,  if  God  created  the  uni- 
verse, the  question  returns,  Whence  came  God  ?  The  same  three 
answers  recur.  God  was  self-existent,  or  he  was  self-created,  or  he 
was  created  ab  extra.  The  last  theory  is  useless.  For  it  leads  to 
an  endless  series  of  potential  existences.  So  the  theist  returns 
to  self-existence  ;  which,  however,  says  Spencer,  is  as  inconceivable 
as  a  self-existent  universe,  involving  the  inconceivable  idea  of  un- 
limited duration. 

Nevertheless,  continues  Spencer,  we  are  compelled  to  regard 
phenomena  as  effects  of  some  cause.  We  must  believe  in  a  cause 
of  that  cause,  till  we  reach  a  first  cause.  The  First  Cause  must 
be  infinite  and  absolute.  He  then  follows  Mansel  in  showing  the 
contradiction  between  the  two  ideas. 

But  total  negation  is  not  the  result,  —  only  nescience.  Atheism, 
Pantheism,  and  Theism  agree  in  one  belief,  namely,  that  of  a  prob- 
lem to  be  solved.  An  unknown  God  is  the  highest  result  of  the- 
ology and  of  philosophy.  "  If  religion  and  science  are  to  be  rec- 
onciled, the  basis  of  the  reconciliation  must  be  their  deepest, 
■widest,  and  most  certain  of  all  facts  —  that  the  power  which  the 
universe  manifests  is  utterly  inscrutable." 

Thus  Mr.  Spencer  proposes  to  take  back  human  thought  eigh- 
teen centuries,  and  ignoring  the  conquests  of  Christian  faith  in 
civilization,  theology,  and  morals,  carries  us  to  Athens,  in  the  time 
of  Paul,  to  worship  at  the  altar  of  an  unknown  God.  He  makes 
a  solitude  in  the  soul,  and  calls  it  peace.  He  makes  peace  between 
religion  and  science,  by  commanding  the  first  to  surrender  at  dis- 
cretion to  the  other.  Science  knows  nothing  of  God;  therefore 
theology  must  know  nothing  of  God.  But  not  so.  Let  each  im- 
part to  the  other  that  which  it  possesses,  and  which  the  other  lacks. 
Let  science  enlarge  theology  with  the  idea  of  law,  and  theology 
inform  science  with  the  idea  of  a  living  God. 

It  is  not  difficult  to  detect  the  fallacies  in  this  argument  of  Spen- 
cer for  religious  nes  :Ience.  His  notion  of  conception  is  that  of  a 
purely  sensible  image  He  assumes  that  we  have  no  knowledge  but 
sensible  knowledge,  and  then   easily  infers  that  we  do  not  know 


APPENDIX.  443 

God.  "We  can  conceive,  he  says,  of  a  rock  on  which  we  are  stand- 
ing, but  not  of  the  whole  earth.  No  great  magnitudes,  he  declares, 
can  be  conceived.  The  conception  of  infinite  time  is,  therefore,  an 
impossibility. 

But  it  is  clear  to  any  one,  not  bound  hand  and  foot  by  the 
assumptions  of  sensationalism,  that  it  is  just  as  easy  to  conceive 
of  the  whole  globe  of  earth,  as  of  the  piece  of  it  which  we  see. 
We  cannot  have  a  visual  image  of  the  whole  earth,  indeed,  but 
the  mental  conception  of  the  globe  is  as  distinct  m  that  of  the 
stone  we  throw  from  our  hand.  And  so  far  from  the  conception  of 
infinite  duration  being  an  impossibility,  not  to  conceive  of  time 
and  space  as  infinite  is  the  impossibility.  It  is  impossible  to  im- 
agine or  conceive  of  the  beginning  of  time,  or  the  commencement 
of  space. 

Looking  at  his  trilemma  concerning  the  universe,  namely,  that 
it  was  either,  (1.)  Self-existent,  (2.)  Self-created,  or,  (3.)  Created 
by  an  external  power,  we  say,  — 

1.  The  real  objection  to  a  self-existent  universe,  is  not  that  we 
cannot  conceive  of  existence  without  beginning.  Nothing  is  easier 
than  to  conceive  of  an  everlasting,  unchanging  universe,  without 
beginning  or  end.  It  is  not  existence,  but  change,  that  suggests 
cause.  Phenomena,  events,  require  us  to  believe  in  some  power 
which  produces  them.  Now,  the  events  which  take  place  in  the 
universe  suggest  an  intelligent,  absolute,  and  central  cause,  that  is, 
a  cause  combining  supreme  wisdom,  power,  and  goodness.  A 
self-existent  universe  is  not  inconceivable,  but  it  is  incredible.        • 

2.  Self-creation,  he  objects,  is  Pantheism.  But  this  is  no  reason 
for  denying  it,  since  Pantheism  may,  for  all  we  see  at  this  stage 
of  the  argument,  be  the  true  explanation  of  the  universe.  The 
real  objection  to  the  hypothesis  of  a  self-created  universe  (or  of  a 
self-created  God),  is  that  it  involves  the  contradiction  of  some- 
thing which  exists  and  which  does  not  exist  at  the  same  moment ; 
at  the  moment  of  self-creation,  the  universe  must  exist  in  order  to 
create,  but  must  be  non-existent  in  order  to  be  created.  A  self- 
created  universe,  then,  is  not  incredible  because  it  involves  Pan- 
theism, but  because  it  involves  a  contradiction. 

3.  He  objects  to  the  Theistic  hypothesis,  that  we  cannot  conceive 
of  the  production  of  matter  (more  strictly,  of  substance)  out  of 
nothing.     He  adds  that  no  simile  can  enable  us  to  imagine  it. 

But  I  can  produce,  out  of  nothing,  something  visible,  tangible, 
and  audible.     There  is  no  motion  and  no  sound.     I  move  my  arm 


444         orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

by  the  power  of  will,  and  I  produce  both  sound  and  motion. 
The  motion  of  a  body  in  space  is  a  material  phenomenon ;  for 
whatever  is  perceived  by  the  senses  is  material.  We  do  then 
constantly  perceive  material  phenomena  created  out  of  nothing, 
by  human  will. 

His  argument  against  the  Theist,  that  space  could  not  have  been 
created  by  God,  since  its  non-existence  is  inconceivable,  is  much 
more  plausible.  But  suppose  we  grant  that  space,  supposed  to  be 
a  real  existence,  was  not  created  in  time.  Does  it  follow  from 
that,  that  it  does  not  proceed  from  God  ?  Not  being  an  event  in 
time,  it  does  not  require  a  cause ;  but  being  conceived  of  as  a 
reality,  it  may  have  eternally  proceeded  from  the  divine  will,  and 
so  not  be  independent  of  the  Creator. 

And  as  regards  his  trilemma  concerning  Deity,  that  also  fails 
in  the  failure  of  his  thesis  that  eternal  duration  is  inconceivable. 
His  argument  against  the  self-existent  Deity,  only  rests  on  that 
assumption  which  we  have  shown  to  be  untenable. 

But  Mr.  Spencer,  who  is  not  a  theologian,  is  at  this  point  reen- 
forced  by  Mr.  Mansel,  on  whose  former  work,  "  The  Limits  of 
Religious  Thought,"  we  proceed  to  offer  some  criticism.  This 
also  is  an  argument  for  nescience  in  theology,  in  the  presumed 
interests  of  revelation.  Mr.  Martineau  has  ably  shown  the 
weakness  and  the  dangerous  tendency  of  this  whole  argument  of 
Mansel,  in  an  article  to  which  we  earnestly  refer  our  readers. 

The  work  of  Mr.  Mansel  is  a  desperate  attempt  to  save  Ortho- 
(fox  doctrines  from  the  objections  of  reason,  not  by  replying  to 
those  objections  and  pointing  out  their  fallacy,  but  by  showing  that 
similar  objections  can  be  brought  against  all  religious  belief.  For 
example,  when  reason  objects  to  the  Trinity,  that  it  is  a  contradic- 
tion, Mr.  Mansel  does  not  attempt  to  show  that  it  is  not  a  contra- 
diction, but  argues  that  our  belief  in  God  is  another  contradiction 
of  the  same  kind.  His  inference  therefore  is,  thafras  we  believe  in 
God,  notwithstanding  the  contradiction,  we  ought  to  believe  in  the 
Trinity  also,  notwithstanding  the  contradiction.  If  we  believe 
one,  we  may  believe  both. 

But  this  is  a  dangerous  ai'gument ;  since  it  is  evident  that  one 
might  reply,  that  there  remains  another  alternative  ;  which  is,  to 
believe  neither.  If  Mr.  Mansel  succeeds  in  convincing  his  readers, 
the  result  may  be  a  belief  in  the  Trinity,  or  it  may  be  a  disbelief 
in  God  altogether ;  one  of  two  things  —  either  a  return  to  Ortho- 
doxy, or  a  departure  from  all  religion.     Either  they  will  renounce 


APPENDIX.  445 

reason  in  order  to  retain  religion,  or  they  will  renounce  religion  in 
order  to  retain  reason. 

At  the  very  best,  also,  the  help  which  this  argument  offers  us  is 
to  be  paid  for  somewhat  dearly.  It  proposes  to  save  Orthodoxy 
by  giving  up  the  use  of  reason  in  religion.  Mr.  Mansel  would  say, 
"by  giving  up  the  unlimited  use  of  reason;"  but,  as  we  shall 
presently  sec,  this  comes  very  much  to  tlie  same  thing  at  last. 

What,  then,  is  the  nature  of  Mr.  Mansel's  argument  ?  It  is  an 
argument  founded  upon  Sir  William  Hamilton's  philosophy  of  the 
Unconditioned.  Now,  this  has  been  generally  considered  the  weak 
side  of  Hamilton's  system.  According  to  him,  the  unconditioned 
is  inconceivable  :  in  other  words,  of  the  Absolute  and  Infinite  we 
have  no  conception  at  all.  But  this  denies  to  man  the  power  of 
conceiving  of  God,  and  so  leads  directly  to  Atheism.  This  charge 
has  already  been  brought  against  Hamilton's  philosophy,  in  vari- 
ous quarters  ;  for  example,  in  the  "  North  British  Review "  for 
May,  1835.  But  we  will  not  here  attempt  any  examination  of 
Hamilton's  theory,  but  confine  ourselves  to  Mr.  Mansel. 

The  argument  of  Mansel  is  this  (p.  75) :  "  To  conceive  the  Deity 
as  he  is,  we  must  conceive  him  as  First  Cause,  as  Absolute,  and 
as  Infinite.  By  the  First  Cause  is  meant  that  which  produces  all 
things,  and  is  itself  produced  of  none  ;  by  the  Absolute  is  meant 
that  which  exists  in  and  by  itself,  having  no  necessary  relation  to 
any  other  being  ;  by  the  Infinite  is  meant  that  which  is  free  from 
all  possible  limitation." 

Having  thus  defined  the  Deity  as  the  First  Cause,  the  Absolute, 
and  the  Infinite,  Mansel  goes  on  to  show  that  these  ideas  are  mu- 
tually contradictory  and  destructive.  A  First  Cause  necessarily 
supposes  effects,  and  therefore  cannot  be  absolute  :  nor  can  the  In- 
finite be  a  person  ;  for  personality  is  a  limitation.  By  a  course  cf 
such  arguments  as  these,  Mansel  endeavors  to  show  that  the  rea- 
son is  as  incapable  of  conceiving  God  as  it  is  of  conceiving  the 
Trinity,  the  Atonement,  or  any  other  Orthodox  doctrine  ;  and  since 
we  do  not  renounce  our  belief  in  God  because  of  these  coniradic- 
tions,  neither  ought  we,  because  of  similar  contradictions,  to  re- 
nounce our  belief  in  the  Trinity. 

Such  is  the  substance  of  Mansel's  statement,  though  the  argu- 
ments by  which  it  is  proved  are  varied  with  great  ingenuity  and  to 
great  extent.  This  course  of  thought  is  by  no  means  original, 
either  with  Mr.  Mansel  or  Sir  William  Hamilton.  A  far  greater 
thinker  than  either  of  them  (Immanuel  Kant)  had  long  before 
38 


446     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

shown  the  logical  contradictions  of  the  understanding  in  what  he 
called  the  Antinomies  of  the  pure  reason.  But  the  important 
question  is,  If  the  reason  contradicts  itself  thus  in  its  conception 
of  Deity,  how  are  we  to  obtain  a  ground  for  our  belief  in  God? 
Mansel  answers,  "  Through  revelation ;  that  is,  through  the  direct 
declarations  of  Scripture."  This  he  calls  faith.  We  are  to  believe 
in  a  personal  God  on  the  ground  of  a  Bible  confirmed  by  miracles. 

This  result  is  so  strange,  that  it  may  well  seem  incredible.  Yet 
we  cannot  think  that  we  have  misrepresented  the  tendency  of  the 
argument ;  though,  of  course,  we  have  given  no  ideas  of  the  acute- 
ness  and  flexibility  of  the  reasoning,  the  extent  of  the  knowledge, 
and  mastery  of  logic,  in  this  work.  That  such  a  position  should  be 
taken  by  a  religious  man,  in  the  supposed  interest  of  Christianity, 
is  sufficiently  strange ;  for  it  seems  to  us  equally  untenable  in  its 
grounds,  unfounded  in  its  statements,  empty  of  insight,  destruc- 
tive in  its  results.  We  will  add,  very  briefly,  a  few  of  the  criti- 
cisms which  occur  to  us. 

The  first  thing  which  strikes  us  in  the  argument  is,  that 
everywhere  it  deals  with  words  rather  than  with  things.  The 
whole  object  of  the  discussion  concerns  the  meaning  of  terras,  and 
it  deals  throughout  with  the  relation  of  words  to  other  words.  It 
is  an  acute  philological  argument.  We  feel  ourselves  to  be  arguing 
about  forms,  and  not  about  substances.  Now,  such  arguments 
may  confuse,  but  they  cannot  convince.  We  do  not  know,  perhaps, 
what  to  say  in  reply  ;  but  we  remain  unsatisfied.  One  not  used  to 
logic  may  listen  to  an  argument  which  shall  conclusively  prove 
that  white  is  black  ;  that  nothing  is  greater  than  something  ;  that 
a  man  who  jumps  from  the  top  of  the  house  can  never  reach  the 
ground  ;  but,  though  the  thing  is  proved,  he  is  not  convinced.  So, 
when  Mr.  Mansel  proves  to  us  that  we  cannot  conceive  of  a  Being 
who  is  at  the  same  time  Infinite  and  Personal,  we  are  unable,  per- 
haps, to  reply  to  the  argument ;  but  we  know  it  to  be  false,  since 
we  actually  have  the  two  conceptions  in  our  mind. 

We  do  conceive  of  the  Deity  as  an  infinite  personality.  Of 
what  use  to  tell  us  that  we  cannot  have  an  idea,  when  we  know 
that  we  do  have  it? 

Mansel  tells  us  that  we  cannot  think  the  idea  of  the  Infinite  and 
Absolute.  He  says  (p.  110),  "The  Absolute  and  the  Infinite  are 
thus,  like  the  Inconceivable  and  Imperceptible,  names  indicating, 
not  an  object  of  thought  or  of  consciousness  at  all,  but  the  mere 
absence  of  the  conditions  under  which  consciousness  is  possible." 


APPENDIX.  447 

But,  then,  they  are  only  words,  with  no  nieaniup  attached  ;  and,  if 
8o,  how  can  we  argue  about  them  at  all  ?  All  argument  must 
cease  when  we  come  to  an  unmeaning  phrase  ;  therefore  the  exist- 
ence of  Mr.  Mansel's  ai"gument  proves  the  falsehood  of  his  asser- 
tion. Since  he  argues  about  the  Infinite^  it  is  evident  that  he  has 
the  idea  of  the  Infinite  in  his  mind. 

Mr.  Mansel  agrees  in  principle  wholly  with  the  Atheists  ;  for 
the  Atheists  do  not  say  that  God  does  not  exist,  or  that  God  can- 
not exist,  but  that  we  cannot  know  that  he  exists.  So  says  Mr. 
Holyoake,  a  leading  modern  Atheist.  This  is  what  Mansel  also 
asserts  ;  only  he  goes  farther  than  they,  contending  that  the  very 
idea  of  God  is  impossible  to  the  human  reason.  It  is  true  that  he 
believes  in  God  on  grounds  of  revelation,  which  the  Atheists  do 
not;  but  he  agrees  with  them  in  setting  aside  all  natural  and  rea- 
sonable knowledge  of  Deity. 

But  how  is  it  possible  to  obtain  an  idea  of  God  from  revelation, 
if  we  are  before  destitute  of  such  an  idea?  When  Paul  preached 
to  the  Athenians,  he  addressed  them  as  having  already  a  true, 
though  an  imperfect,  idea  of  God.  "  Whom,  therefore,  ye  igno- 
rantly  worship,  him  declare  I  unto  you."  But,  if  they  had  not 
already  an  idea  of  God,  how  could  he  have  given  them  such  an 
idea  ?  Suppose  that  he  works  a  miracle,  and  says,  "  This  miracle 
proves  that  God  has  sent  me  to  teach  you."  But,  by  the  supposition, 
they  know  nothing  about  God ;  consequently,  they  have  nothing 
by  which  to  test  the  truth  of  a  I'evelation  professing  to  come  from 
him.  Neither  miracles,  nor  the  nature  of  the  truth  taught,  nor  the 
character  of  the  teacher,  avail  anything  as  evidence  of  a  revelation 
from  a  Being  of  whom  we  know  nothing.  Without  a  previous 
knowledge  of  God,  only  immediate  revelation  is  possible. 

Mr.  Mansel,  therefore,  is  one  who,  without  a  foundation,  builds  a 
house  on  the  sand.  He  attempts  to  erect  faith  in  God  after  taking 
away  the  foundation  of  reason.  The  apostles  built  revealed  religion 
upon  natural  religion,  revealed  theology  upon  natural  theology,  ac- 
cording to  the  rule,  "  That  is  not  first  which  is  spiritual,  but  that  which 
is  natural ;  afterward  that  which  is  spiritual."  Christ  said,  "  Ye 
believe  in  God  :  believe  also  in  me."  Mr.  Mansel  reverses  all  this, 
and  makes  Christ  say,  "  Ye  believe  in  me  :  believe  also  in  God." 

But,  even  if  it  were  possible  to  ascend  to  belief  in  God  through 
belief  in  Christ,  we  must  ask,  Is  not  belief  thought  ?  If  the  mind 
cannot  think  the  Infinite,  how  can  it  believe  the  Infinite  ?  Must 
we  not  apprehend  a  proposition  before  we  can  believe  it?     Doe8 


448    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

not  the  conception  of  a  thing  logically  precede  the  belief  of  it  ?  If 
it  is  impossible  to  apprehend  the  Absolute,  if  this  is  only  an  empty 
name,  how  is  it  possible  to  believe  in  the  Absolute  on  grounds  of 
revelation,  or  on  any  other  grounds  ?  A  miracle  cannot  com- 
municate to  the  mind  an  idea  which  is  beyond  its  power  of 
conception. 

Mr.  Mansel  declares  that  our  religious  knowledge  is  regulative, 
but  not  speculative. 

He  lays  great  stress  on  this  distinction  :  by  which  he  means 
that  we  have  ideas  of  the  Deity  sufficient  to  guide  our  practice, 
but  not  to  satisfy  our  intellect ;  which  tell  us,  not  what  God  is  in 
himself,  but  how  he  wills  that  we  should  think  of  him.  According 
to  this  view,  all  revelation  is  overturned,  just  as  all  natural  religion 
has  been  previously  overturned.  Revelation  does  not  reveal  God 
on  this  theory.  We  have  no  knowledge  of  God  in  the  gospel,  any 
more  than  we  had  in  nature.  Instead  of  knowledge,  we  have  only 
law.  But  this  seems  to  despoil  Christianity  of  its  vital  force. 
Christ  says,  "  This  is  life  eternal,  to  know  thee,  the  only  true 
God."  But  Mr.  Mansel  tells  us  that  such  knowledge  of  God  is 
impossible.  Therefore,  instead  of  the  gospel,  he  gives  us  the  law ; 
for  it  is  certain  t\idit  hi^s,  regulative  truths  are  simply  moral 'pre- 
cepts, addressed  to  the  will,  not  to  the  intellect ;  capable  of  being 
obeyed,  but  not  of  being  understood. 

The  radical  error  of  Mansel  seems  to  be  this,  — that  his  mind 
works  only  in  the  logical  region  belonging  to  the  understanding, 
and  is  ignorant  of  those  higher  truths  which  are  beheld  by  the 
reason.  He  has  tried  to  find  God  by  logical  processes,  and,  of 
course,  has  failed.  He  therefore  concludes  that  God  cannot  be 
known  by  the  intellect.  He  has  fully  demonstrated  that  God 
cannot  be  comprehended  by  the  logical  understanding ;  and  in 
this  he  has  done  a  good  work.  But  he  has  not  shown  that  God 
cannot  be  known  by  the  intuitive  reason.  .The  understanding 
comprehends :  the  reason  apprehends.  The  understanding  per- 
ceives the  form :  reason  takes  holds  of  the  substance.  The  under- 
standing sees  how  things  are  related  to  each  other :  the  reason 
sees  how  things  are  in  themselves.  The  understanding  cannot, 
therefore,  see  the  infinite  and  absolute ;  cannot  apprehend  sub- 
stance or  cause  ;  knows  nothing  of  the  eternal.  But  the  reason  is 
as  certain  of  cause  as  of  effect ;  knov/s  eternity  as  really  as  it 
knows  time  ;  it  is  as  sure  of  the  existence  of  spirit  as  it  is  of  mat- 
ter ;  and  sees  the  infinite  to  be  as  real  as  the  finite.     Therefore, 


APPENDIX.  449 

though  we  cannot  comprehend  God  by  logic,  we  can  a])prehend 
him  by  reason.  We  can  be  as  sure  of  his  being  as  we  are  of  our 
own,  and  we  are  not  obliged  to  explain  away  all  those  profound 
scriptures  which  teach  us  that  the  object  and  end  of  our  being  is 
to  know  God. 

Since,  therefore,  Mr.  Mansel's  argument,  with  all  its  acuteness, 
learning,  and  honesty,  tends  directly  to  Atheism  ;  since,  by  over- 
turning the  foundation  of  Christianity,  it  overturns  Christianity 
itself;  since  it  substitutes  mere  moral  laws  in  place  of  the  vital 
forces  of  the  gospel,  —  it  is  no  wonder  that  its  positions  have  been 
rejected  with  much  unanimity  by  the  most  eminent  Orthodox  schol- 
ars. Its  defence  of  Orthodoxy  costs  too  much.  Leading  thinkers 
of  very  different  schools  —  for  example,  Mr.  Brownson,  the  Ko- 
man  Cathohc,  in  his  "  Quarterly  lleview  ;  "  Professor  Hickok,  the 
Presbyterian,  in  the  "  Bibliotheca  Sacra  ;  "  and  Mr.  Maurice,  of  the 
Church  of  England,  in  an  able  pamphlet  —  have  opposed  with 
gi'eat  force  the  arguments  and  conclusions  of  this  volume.  It  is 
true  that  some  Orthodox  divines  consider  that  Mr.  Mansel  has 
demonstrated  that  the  human  consciousness  is  unequal  to  the 
speculative  conception  of  a  Being  at  once  absolute,  infinite,  and 
personal,  and  seem  gladly  to  have  the  aid  of  this  book  in  de- 
fending the  Trinity.  But  the  more  distinguished  and  experienced 
thinkers  mentioned  above  are  cautious  of  accepting  the  help  of  so 
dangerous  an  ally. 

§  2.  On  the  Defence  of  Verbal  Inspiration  by  Oaussen.  Fol- 
lowing the  declaration  of  the  apostle  Paul,  that  "  the  letter  killeth," 
we  have,  in  the  text  of  this  volume,  set  aside  all  the  theories  of 
the  Bible  which  assume  its  absolute  and  literal  infallibility.  But 
within  a  few  years,  a  work  in  defence  of  this  doctrine  has  been 
published  abroad,  by  an  excellent  man,  M.  Gaussen,  of  Geneva, 
and  translated  and  republished  in  America  by  Rev.  Dr.  Kirk,  of 
Boston.  Such  a  work,  coming  from  such  sources,  deserves  some 
examination.  We  shall,  therefore,  show  the  course  of  argument 
followed  in  this  book,  and  the  i-easons  which  lead  us  to  consider 
its  conclusions  unsound,  and  its  reasoning  inadequate. 

Inspiration,  as  defined  by  Gaussen,  is  "  that  inexplicable  power 
which  the  divine  Spirit  formerly  exercised  over  the  authors  of  the 
Holy  Scriptures,  to  guide  them  even  in  the  emjiloyment  of  the 
words  they  were  to  use,  and  to  preserve  them  from  all  error,  as 
well  as  from  every  omission  ? 

"  We  aim,"  says  he,  "  to  establish,  by  the  word  of  God,  that  the 
38* 


450     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

Scrip tui'es  are  from  God — that  all  the  Scriptures  are  from  God  — 
and  that  every  part  of  the  Scripture  is  from  God." 

Let  us  consider  the  arguments  in  support  of  this  kind  of  inspi- 
ration, and  the  objections  to  them. 

Argument  I.  Plenary  Inspiration  is  necessary,  that  we  may 
know  with  certainty,  xoliat  ive  ought  to  believe. 

Great  stress  is  laid  upon  this  supposed  necessity,  both  by 
Gaussen  and  Kirk. 

"  The  book  so  written,"  say  they,  "  is  the  Word  of  God,  and 
binds  the  conscience  of  the  world ;  and  nothing  else  does  so  bind 
it,  even  though  it  were  the  writings  of  Paul  and  Peter. 

"  With  the  Infidel,  whether  he  be  Christian  in  name  or  other- 
wise, the  sharp  sword  of  a  perfect  inspiration  will  be  found,  at 
last,  indispensable.  If  the  ground  is  conceded  to  him  that  there  is 
a  single  passage  in  the  Bible  that'  is  not  divine,  then  we  are  dis- 
armed ;  for  he  will  be  sure  to  apply  this  privilege  to  the  very 
passages  which  most  fully  oppose  his  pride,  passion,  and  error. 
How  is  the  conscience  of  a  wicked  race  to  be  bound  down  by  a 
chain,  one  link  of  which  is  weak  ?  " 

Reply  to  Argiunoit  I.  —  It  is  no  way  to  prove  a  theory  true  to 
assume  its  necessity.  The  only  legitimate  proof  of  a  theory  is  by 
an  induction  of  facts.  This  method  of  beginning  by  a  supposed 
necessity,  this  looking  first  at  consequences,  has  always  been 
fruitful  of  false  and  em2}ty  theories.  The  great  advance  in  modern 
science  has  come  from  substituting  the  inductive  for  the  ideolo- 
gical method.  Find  what  the  facts  say,  and  the  consequences  will 
take  care  of  themselves.  An  argument  from  consequences  is 
usually  only  an  appeal  to  prejudices. 

Again  :  This  argument  is  fatal  to  the  arguments  drawn  from  the 
Scriptures  themselves.  In  arguing  from  the  Scripture  to  prove 
that  every  passage  is  divine,  we  have,  of  course,  no  right  to 
assume  that  every  passage  is  divine,  for  that  is  the  very  thing  to 
be  proved.  Then  the  texts  which  we  quote  to  prove  our  position 
may  themselves  not  be  divine,  and  if  we  grant  that,  "  we  are 
disarmed."  For,  according  to  this  argument,  nothing  can  be 
proved  conclusively  from  Scripture  except  we  believe  in  plenary 
inspiration  —  then  plenary  inspiration  itself  cannot  be  proved 
from  Scripture.  But  Gaussen  admits  that  this  doctrine  can  be 
proved  "  only  by  the  Scriptures ;  "  therefore  (according  to  this 
argument)  it  cannot  be  proved  at  all. 

If,  therefore,  the  doctrine  of  plenary  inspiration  is  necessary  "  to 


APPENDIX.  451 

bind  the  conscience  of  the  world,"  it  is  a  doctrine  incapable  of 
proof.  If,  on  the  other  hand,  it  can  be  proved,  it  is  then  clearly 
not  necessary  "  to  bind  the  conscience  of  the  world." 

But  again.  This  theory  of  plenary  ins|)iration  does  not  bind  the 
consciences  of  men.  If  men  are  naturally  dis])osed  (as  Messrs. 
Gaussen  and  Kirk  maintain)  to  deny  and  disbelieve  the  doctrines 
and  statements  of  the  Bible,  they  have  ample  opportunity  of 
doing  so,  notwithstanding  their  belief  in  this  theory.  For,  after 
admitting  that  the  words  of  Scripture,  just  as  they  stand,  are  per- 
fectly true  and  given  by  God,  the  question  conies,  What  do  they 
mean  ?  For  instance,  I  wish,  we  will  suppose,  to  deny  the  doc- 
trine of  the  Deity  of  Christ.  Now,  you  quote  to  me  the  text 
Rom.  9:5.  "  Of  whom,  as  concerning  the  flesh,  Christ  came, 
who  is  over  all,  God,  blessed  forever,"  —  which  is  the  strongest 
text  in  the  Bible  in  support  of  that  doctrine.  Now,  though  I 
believe  in  the  doctrine  of  plenary  inspiration,  I  am  not  obliged  to 
accept  this  passage  as  proof  of  the  Deity  of  Christ.  For  I  can, 
1.  Assert  that  the  verse  is  au  interpolation ;  2.  Assert  that  it  is 
wrongly  pointed;  3.  Assert  that  it  is  mistranslated;  4.  Assert 
that  Christ  is  called  God  in  an  inferior  sense,  as  God  over  the 
Church.  And,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  these  are  the  arguments  always 
used,  even  by  those  who  deny  the  doctrine  of  a  plenary  inspira- 
tion. They  seldom  or  never  accuse  the  writer  of  a  mistake,  but 
always  rely  on  a  supposed  mistranslation,  or  misinterpretation,  in 
order  to  avoid  the  force  of  a  passage.  Hence,  also,  we  find 
believers  in  this  doctrine  of  plenary  inspiration,  differing  in  opinion 
on  a  thousand  matters,  and  with  no  probability  of  ever  coming  to 
an  agreement. 

Argument  II.  Several  Passages  of  the  New  Testament  plainly 
teach  the  Doctrine  of  the  Plenary  Inspiration  of  the  Bible. 

The  passages  quoted  by  Gaussen,  and  mainly  relied  upon,  are 
2  Tim.  3  :  16.  "  All  Scripture  is  given  by  inspiration,"  &d.  ; 
2  Peter  1  :  27,  "  Holy  men  of  God  spake  as  they  were  moved,"  &c. 
Besides  these,  he  refers  to  many  passages  in  the  Old  and  New 
Testaments,  but  his  chief  stress  is  laid  on  these. 

Reply  to  Argument  II.  —  It  is  well  known  that  both  these  pas- 
sages refer  only  to  the  Old  Testament  Scriptures.  It  is  well 
known  that  the  first  may  be  translated  so  as  to  read,  "  All  Scrip- 
ture, given  by  inspiration,  is  profitable,"  &c.  But  it  is  reply 
enough  to  both  these  passages,  to  say,  that  neither  of  them  indi- 
cates what  kind  of  inspiration  is  intended.     They  assert  an  inspi- 


452     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

ration,  which  we  also  maintain.  But  they  do  not  assert  a  verbal 
inspiration,  nor  one  which  makes  the  Scriptures  infallible,  but 
simply  one  which  makes  them  profitable. 

The  stress  laid  on  the  passage  2  Tim.  3  :  16,  "  All  Scripture," 
&c.,  is  itself  an  argument  against  the  theory  of  plenary  inspira- 
tion. The  most  which  can  be  made  of  this  text,  by  any  punctua- 
tion or  translation,  is,  that  all  the  Scripture  is  written  by  inspired 
men.  What  was  the  degree  or  kind  of  their  inspiration,  is  not  in 
the  least  indicated.  It  might  have  been  verbal,  it  might  have  been 
the  inspiration  of  suggestion,  or  of  superintendence,  or  the  gen- 
eral inspiration  of  all  Christians. 

Gaussen's  only  argument  on  this  point  is,  "  that  it  is  the  writing 
which  is  said  to  be  inspired,  and  writing  must  be  in  words ;  hence 
the  inspiration  must  be  verbal."  To  this  we  must  reply,  that  in- 
spired writing  can  only  mean  what  is  written  by  inspired  men. 
The  writing  itself  cannot  be  inspii-ed.  This  argument  is  too  flimsy 
to  be  dwelt  upon. 

But  further  still.  There  is  another  argument  which  lies  against 
every  attempt  to  prove  plenary  inspiration  out  of  the  Scripture. 
Every  such  attempt  is  necessarily  reasoning  in  a  circle.  Gaussen 
and  Kirk  have  labored  earnestly  to  reply  to  this  argument,  but  in 
vain.  The  answer  they  make  is,  "  We  are  not  reasoning  with 
Infidels,  but  with  Christians.  We  address  men  who  respect  the 
Scriptures,  and  who  admit  their  truth.  The  Scriptures  are  in- 
spired, we  afiirm,  because,  being  authentic  and  true,  they  declare 
themselves  inspired  ;  and  the  Scriptures  are  plenarily  inspired,  be- 
cause, being  inspired,  they  say  that  they  are  so  totally,  and  with- 
out any  exception." 

But  we  answer  Messrs.  Gaussen  and  Kirk  thus:  "You  are 
indeed  reasoning  with  Christians,  not  with  Deists ;  but  you  are 
reasoning  with  Christians  who  do  not  believe  that  every  passage 
of  Scripture  is  infalHbly  inspired.  To  prove  your  doctrine  fi  om 
any  particular  passages  or  verbal  expressions,  you  must  prove  that 
those  particular  passages  and  expressions  are  not  themselves 
en-ors.  You  yourselves  assert  that  this  cannot  be  done,  except  we 
believe  these  passages  to  be  infallibly  inspired.  Therefore  you 
must  assume  infallible  inspiration  in  order  to  prove  infallible 
inspiration.  In  other  words,  you  beg  the  question  instead  of 
arguing  it." 

In  this  vicious  circle  the  advocates  of  a  verbal  inspiration  of 
infallibility  are  necessarily  imprisoned  whenever  they  attempt  to 


1 


APPENDIX.  453 

argue  from  the  words  of  Scripture.  They  contend  that  one  must 
believe  their  theory  in  order  to  be  sure  that  any  passage  is  abso- 
lutely true,  and  then  they  quote  passages  to  prove  their  theory,  as 
if  they  were  absolutely  ti'ue. 

Argument  III.  The  theory  of  plenainj  inspiration  is  simple, 
precise,  intelligible,  aiid  ea.si/  to  be  applied. 

We  admit  this  to  be  true.  It  has  this  merit  in  common  with 
the  opposite  theory  of  no  inspiration.  Both  are  simple,  precise,* 
and  very  easy  of  application.  But  simplicity  is  not  always  a  sign 
of  truth.  The  facts  of  nature  and  life  are  more  apt  to  be  complex 
than  simple.  Theories  distinguished  by  their  simplicity  most 
commonly  ignore  or  omit  a  part  of  the  facts.  Simplistic  theories  are 
generally  one-sided  and  partial.  Materialism,  Atheism,  Idealism, 
Fatalism,  are  all  very  simple  theories,  and  explain  all  difficulties  with 
a  marvellous  rapidity.  This  makes  them,  at  first,  attractive  to  the 
intellect,  which  always  loves  clear  and  distinct  views ;  but  after- 
wards, when  it  is  seen  that  they  obtain  clearness  by  means  of 
shallowness,  they  are  found  unsatisfactory. 

Argument  IV.  The  quotations  from  the  Old  Testament,  by 
Jesus  and  his  apostles,  shoio  that  they  regarded  its  language  as 
infallibly  inspired. 

This  argument,  upon  which  great  stress  is  laid,  both  by  Prof. 
Gaussen  and  Dr.  Kirk,  though  plausible  at  first  sight,  becomes 
wholly  untenable  on  examination. 

Thus,  in  the  temptation  of  Jesus,  in  his  reply  to  the  tempter,  he 
says,  "  Thou  shalt  not  live  by  bread  alone ; "  the  whole  force  of 
the  argument  depending  on  the  single  word  alone. 

Replying  to  the  Sadducees,  who  denied  the  resurrection,  he 
says,  "  Have  ye  not  read  that  God  says,  I  am  the  God  of  Abra- 
ham, and  of  Isaac,  and  of  Jacob  ?  God  is  not  the  God  of  the 
dead,  but  of  the  living."  Then  the  whole  stress  of  the  argument 
rests  on  the  use  of  the  verb  in  the  present  tense,  "  I  am." 

Arguing  with  the  Pharisees,  "  How  did  David,  by  the  Spirit, 
call  him  Lord,  saying.  The  Lord  said  to  ray  Lord,"  &c.  P  Here  the 
ai'gument  depends  on  the  use  of  the  single  word  Lord. 

Many  more  instances  could  be  produced  of  the  same  kind ;  and 
Gaussen  contends,  that  when  Jesus  and  his  apostles  thus  rest  their 
argument  on  the  force  of  a  single  word  of  the  Old  Testament,  they 
must  have  believed  that  the  very  words  were  given  by  inspiration. 
For  otherwise  the  writers  might  not  have  chosen  the  right  word  to 
express  their  thought  in  each  particular  case.     And  unless  the 


454     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

Jews  had  also  believed  in  the  verbal  inspiration  of  their  Scriptures, 
they  would  have  replied  that  these  particular  words  might  have 
been  errors. 

Beply  to  this  Argument.  —  Plausible  as  this  argument  may  seem, 
it  turns  out  to  be  wholly  empty  and  worthless.  Whenever  any 
writer  is  admitted  to  be  an  authority,  then  his  words  become 
authoritative,  and  arguments  are  necessarily  based  on  single  words 
and  expressions.  In  all  such  cases,  we  assume  that  he  chose  the 
best  words  by  which  to  convey  his  thought,  and  yet  we  do  not 
ascribe  to  him  any  inspiration  or  infallibility. 

Thus,  go  into  our  courts  of  law,  and  you  will  hear  the  language  of 
the  United  States  constitution,  of  the  acts  of  legislatm-e,  of  previous 
decisions'  of  the  courts,  argued  from,  word  by  word.  Counsel  argue 
by  the  hour  upon  the  force  and  -weight  of  single  words  in  the 
authorities.  Judges  in  their  charges  instruct  the  jury  to  determine 
the  life  and  death  of  the  criminal  according  to  the  letter  of  the 
law.  And  this  they  do  necessarily,  according  to  the  rule,  "  Cum 
recedit  a  litera,  judex  transit  in  legislator  em."  But  will  any  one 
maintain  that  the  counsel  and  court  believe  that  the  legislature 
was  infallibly  inspired  to  choose  the  very  language  which  would 
convey  their  meaning  ? 

In  this  very  argument  for  plenary  inspiration,  Gaussen  and  his 
associates  rest  their  argument  on  the  single  word  "  all,"  in  the 
text,  "  All  Scripture  is  given  by  inspiration,"  &c.  Yet,  say  they, 
we  are  not  assuming  that  this  text  is  plenarily  inspired,  for  that, 
we  admit,  would  be  begging  the  question.  If,  then,  Mr.  Gaussen 
can  argue  from  the  force  of  the  single  word  all,  without  assuming 
the  doctrine  of  plenary  inspii-ation,  why  could  not  Jesus  and  his 
apostles  argue  from  single  words,  without  assuming  the  doctrine 
of  plenary  inspiration  ? 

There  is,  however,  a  passage  in  Paul  (Gal.  3  :  16),  in  which  the 
apostle  quotes  a  text  from  the  Old  Testament,  and  lays  the  whole 
stress  of  his  argument  on  two  letters.  "  He  says  not,  '  And  to 
seeds '  (anigfiuGiv),  as  of  many,  but  as  of  one,  'And  to  thy  seed' 
{aTTSQfiaTi,)."  According  to  Gaussen's  argument,  Paul  must  have 
believed  in  the  inspiration  of  the  letters.  But  Gaussen  is  careful 
not  to  adduce  this  instance,  which  seems  at  first  so  much  in  his 
favor.  For,  in  fact,  both  in  Hebrew  and  Greek,  as  in  English, 
"seed"  is  a  collective  noun,  and  does  mean  many  in  the  singu- 
lar. The  argument  of  Paul,  therefore,  falls  through;  and  it  is 
evident  that  he  is  no  example  to  be  imitated  here,  in  laying  stress 


APPENDIX. 


457 


ori  trne  01  two  letters.     Most  modern  interpreters  admit  tlii.^"^ 
made  a,  mistake ;  and  so,  among  the  ancients,  did  Jerome,  \\ 
nevertheless  said  the  argument  "  was  good  enough  for  the  foolish 
Galatiuns." 

Having  thus  replied,  very  briefly,  but  we  believe  suflBciently,  to 
the  main  arguments  in  support  of  this  theory,  we  say,  in  conclu- 
sion, that  it  cannot  be  true,  for  the  following  reasons,  which  we 
simply  state,  and  do  not  now  attempt  to  unfold. 

1.  The  Xew  Testament  writers  nowhere  claim  to  be  iniiiUibly 
inspired  to  write.  If  they  had  been  infallibly  insj)ired  to  write  the 
Gospels  and  Epistles,  they  certainly  ought  to  have  announced  this 
important  fact.  Instead  of  which  Luke  gives  as  his  reason  for 
writing,  not  that  God  inspired  liim  to  write,  but  tliat  "  inasmuch  as 
others  have  taken  in  hand  "  to  write,  it  seemed  good  to  him  also  to 
do  the  same,  and  that  for  the  benefit  of  Theophilus.  John  and 
Paul  assert  the  truth  of  what  they  say,  but  not  on  account  of  their 
being  inspired  to  write,  but  because  they  are  disciples  and  apostles. 

2.  The  diiierences  in  the  accounts  of  the  same  transactions  show 
that  theii"  inspiration  was  not  verbal. 

These  diff'erences  appear  on  every  page  of  any  Harmony  of  the 
New  Testament.  They  arc  numerous  but  unimportant ;  they  go 
to  prove  the  truth  of  the  narrative,  and  give  probability  to  the 
main  Gospel  statements.  But  they  utterly  disprove  the  theory  of 
plenary  inspiration. 

3.  Paul  declares  that  some  things  which  he  says  are  "  of  the 
Lord,"  other  things  "  of  himself; "  that  in  regard  to  some  things 
he  was  inspired,  in  regard  to  others,  not. 

4.  Every  writer  in  the  Xew  Testament  has  a  style  of  his  own, 
and  there  is  no  appearance  of  his  being  merely  an  amanuensis. 

5.  While  the  New  Testament  writers  lay  no  claim  to  any  such 
inspiration  as  this  theory  assumes,  they  do  claim  for  themselves 
and  for  all  other  Christians  another  kind  of  inspiration,  which  is 
sufficient  for  all  the  facts,  and  which  gives  them  ample  authority 
over  our  faith  and  life,  and  makes  them  independent  sources  of 
Christian  truth. 

This  view  we  have  already  sufficiently  considered  in  our  chapter 
on  inspiration. 

§  3.  Defence  of  the  Doctrine  that  Sin  is  a  Nature,  by  Professor 
Shedd.  In  the  "  Christian  Review  "  for  1852  appeai-ed  an  article  of 
great  power,  written  by  a  gentleman  who  has  since  become  eminent 
as  a  thinker  and  writer  —  Professor  W.  G.  T.  Shedd.     The  title  of 


454     orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

j,^rl;icle  was  calculated  to  attract  attention,  as  a  bold  attempt  to 

xcnd  an  extreme  i^osition  of  Calvinism  — "  Sin  a  Nature,  and 
that  Nature  Guilt."  The  article  was  so  rational  and  clear  that  we 
consider  it  as  being  even  now  the  best  statement  extant  of  this 
thorough-going  Calvinism,  and  therefore  devote  a  few  pages  here 
to  its  examination.* 

After  some  introductory  remarks,  which  it  is  not  necessary  to 
notice,  the  writer  lays  down  his  first  position,  that  sin  is  a  nature. 
His  statement  is,  that  we  all  sin  necessarily  and  contmuaUy  in  con- 
sequence of  0U7'  nature,  i.  e..  the  character  born  with  us,  original 
and  innate. 

The  proofs  of  this  position  are,  1.  The  language  of  St.  Paul 
(Eph.  2:3),"  We  were  by  nature  the  children  of  wrath,  even  as 
others."  2.  That  we  are  compelled  by  the  laws  of  our  mind  to 
refer  volitions  to  a  nature,  as  quaUties  to  a  substance.  We  can- 
not stop  in  the  outward  act  of  sin,  but  by  a  mental  instinct  look 
inward  to  the  particular  volition  from  which  the  sin  came.  Nor  can 
the  mind  stop  with  this  particular  volition.  There  is  a  steady  and 
uniform  state  of  character,  which  particular  volitions  cannot  ex- 
plam.  The  instinct  of  reason  causes  us  to  look  back  for  one  com- 
mon principle  and  source,  which  shall  give  unity  to  the  subject ; 
and,  having  attained  a  view  both  central  and  simple,  it  is  satisfied. 
As  our  mind  compels  us  to  refer  all  properties  to  a  substance  in 
which  they  inhere,  so  it  compels  us  to  refer  all  similar  volitions  to 
a  simple  nature.  When  we  see  exercises  of  the  soul,  Ave  as  in- 
stinctively refer  them  to  a  nature  in  that  soul,  as  we  refer  the  prop- 
erties of  a  body  to  the  substance  of  that  body.  3.  Chi-istian  expe- 
rience proves  that  sin  is  a  nature.  The  Chi'istian,  especially  as 
his  experience  deepens,  is  troubled,  not  so  much  by  his  separate 
sinful  actions  and  volitions,  as  by  the  sinful  nature  which  they 
indicate,  and  out  of  which  they  spring.  We  are  compelled  to  be- 
lieve, as  we  look  inward,  that  there  is  a  principle  of  evil  within  us, 
below  those  separate  transgressions  of  which  we  are  conscious. 
There  is  a  diseased  condition  of  the  soul,  which  these  transgres- 
sions indicate.  There  are  secret  faults  from  which  we  pray  to  be 
cleansed.  4.  The  history  of  Christian  doctrine  shows  that  the 
Church  has  in  all  ages  believed  in  a  sinful  nature,  as  distinguished 
from  conscious  transgressions. 

These  are* the  proofs  of  the  first  position,  that  sin  is  a  nature. 

*  The  substance  of  what  follows  in  this  section,  appeared  in  the  "  Christian 
Examiner." 


APPENDIX.  457 

We  have  stated  them  concisely,  but  with  sufficient  distinctness  and 
completeness.     Let  us  now  examine  tlieir  validity. 

The  first  argument  is  the  text  in  Ephesians,  "  We  were  by  na- 
ture children  of  wrath,"  ^uei'  lixvu  tpvaei  doy^g.  The  word  cpixng, 
the  writer  contends, '"  always  denotes  something  original  and  innate, 
in  contradistinction  to  something  acquired  by  ])ractice  or  habit." 
This  text,  we  know,  is  the  proof-text  of  original  sin,  and  is  con- 
sidered by  many  commentators  as  teaching  that  man's  nature  is 
wholly  corrupt.  But  plainly  this  is  going  too  far.  Granting  the 
full  meaning  claimed  for  the  word  (pvcng,  the  text  only  asserts  that 
there  is  something  in  man's  nature  which  exposes  him  to  the  di- 
vine displeasure  by  being  the  source  of  sin.  It  does  not  assert 
the  corruption  of  the  whole  nature,  nor  preclude  the  supposition 
that  we  are  born  with  tendencies  to  good,  no  less  than  to  evil. 
That  we  are  so,  the  writer  is  bound  by  his  own  statement  to  ad- 
mit ;  for  if  this  Greek  word  "  always  denotes  something  original 
and  innate,"  it  denotes  this  in  Rom.  2  :  14,*  which  declares  that 
the  Gentiles  "  do  by  nature  the  things  contained  in  the  law."  Ac- 
cording to  this  passage  in  Romans,  if  there  be  such  a  thing  as 
natural  depravity,  it  is  not  total ;  and  if  there  be  such  a  thing  as 
total  depravity,  it  is  not  natural.  Those  who  wish  to  maintain 
both  doctrines  can  only  do  it  by  admitting  two  different  kinds  of 
sinfulness  in  man,  one  of  which  is  natural,  but  not  total ;  the  other 
total,  but  not  natural  —  a  distinction  which  we  esteem  a  sound 
one.  According  to  this  passage  in  Rom.  2  :  14,  we  must  un- 
derstand (fvaig  as  referring  to  the  good  side  of  man's  nature,  and 
the  same  word  in  Eph.  2  :  3  as  referring  to  the  corrupt  side  of 
man's  moral  nature.  The  first  refers  to  the  "  law  of  the  mind ;  " 
the  St  cond,  to  the  other  "  law  in  the  members  "  (Rom.  7  :  23). 
But  tl  ere  is  another  passage  (Gal.  2 :  15),  which  asserts  that  the 
Jews  by  nature  are  not  sinners,  like  the  heathen.  Now,  as  we  can 
hardly  suppose  that  the  original  instincts  and  innate  tendencies  of 
the  Jewish  child  were  radically  good  from  birth,  and  essentially 
different  from  those  of  the  heathen,  and  as  such  a  supposition 
would  contradict  the  whole  argument  of  Paul  in  Rom.  ch.  2,  it  is 

*  The  nature  by  which  the  heathen  "  do  the  thing's  contained  in  the  law," 
i.  e.,  obey  God,  which  is  here  (Rom.  2  :  15)  called  "  the  law  written  in  the 
heart,"  is  in  Rom.  7  :  23  called  '-the  law  of  the  mind."  Olshausen  (a  suffi- 
ciently Orthodox  commentator),  says,  "  It  is  wholly  false  to  understand  brav 
voifj  of  a  mere  ideal  possibiliti/ ;  the  apostle  speaks  evidently  of  a  real  and 
actual  obedience.  Paul  infers  that,  because  there  are  actually  pious  heathen, 
they  must  have  a  law  which  they  obey."    Ad  locum. 

39 


458     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

evident  that  ^iaif  in  Gal.  2 :  15  does  not  denote  something 
original  and  innate.  The  meaning  of  this  verse  probably  is,  that 
the  Jew  from  birth  up,  and  by  the  mere  fact  of  being  born  a  Jew, 
came  under  the  influences  of  a  religious  education,  which  preserved 
him  from  many  forms  of  heathen  depravity.  The  word,  therefore, 
means  in  that  passage,  not  a  Jew  by  nature,  but  a  Jew  by  birth ; 
and,  if  so,  we  are  at  liberty,  if  we  choose,  to  ascribe  the  same 
meaning  to  the  word  in  Ephesians,  and  to  understand  the  text  to 
teach  that  we  were  by  birth  placed  under  circumstances  wliich 
tended  necessarily  to  deprave  the  character. 

This  passage,  therefore,  quoted  by  the  writer,  does  not  teach 
entire  depravity  by  nature,  but  a  partial  depravity,  either  found  in 
the  hereditary  tendencies  and  instincts,  or  acquired  by  means  of  the 
evil  circumstances  surrounding  the  child  from  his  birth. 

The  second  argument  of  the  writer  is,  that  the  laws  of  mind 
compel  us  to  refer  sinful  volitions  to  a  sinful  nature,  as  they  com- 
pel us  to  refer  qualities  to  a  substance. 

We  admit  that,  where  we  see  uniform  and  constant  habits  of 
action,  we  are  compelled  to  refer  these  to  a  permanent  character 
or  state  of  being.  If  a  man  once  in  his  life  becomes  intoxicated, 
we  do  not  infer  any  habit  of  intemperance,  or  any  vicious  ten- 
dency ;  but  if  he  is  habitually  intemperate,  we  are  compelled,  as 
the  writer  justly  asserts,  to  look  beneath  the  separate  single  actions 
for  one  common  principle  and  source.  But  in  assuming  that  this 
source  is  a  nature  brought  with  us  into  the  world,  the  writer  seems 
to  us  to  jump  to  a  conclusion.  It  may  be  an  acquired  character, 
not  an  original  nature.  It  may  be  an  induced  state  of  disease 
either  of  body  or  mind,  a  depravity  which  has  commenced  this  side 
of  childhood.  We  know  that  there  are  acquired  habits  both  of 
mind  and  of  body ;  otherwise,  not  only  would  it  be  impossible  for 
a  man  to  grow  worse,  but  it  would  also  be  impossible  for  him  to 
grow  better,  and  there  would  be  an  end  to  all  improvement  and 
progress.  Such  an  acquired  character  Introduces  unity  into  the 
subject  of  investigation,  as  completely  as  does  an  original  nature, 
and  therefore  satisfies  all  the  wants  of  the  mind. 

A  precisely  similar  answer  may  be  made  to  the  writer's  third 
argument,  drawn  from  Christian  experience.  He  is  perfectly 
right,  we  think.  In  saying  that  the  Christian  Is  troubled,  not  mere- 
ly, nor  chiefly,  by  the  reccoUectlon  of  single  acts  and  volitions 
of  evil,  but  In  the  evidence  which  they  seem  to  give  of  a  sinful 
6tate  of  mind  and  heart.     He  Is  right  in  considering  any  theory  of 


APPENDIX.  459 

moral  evil  shallow  and  inadequate  which  only  takes  into  account 
sinful  actions  and  sinful  volitions.  What  earnest  man,  who  has 
seriously  set  about  correcting  a  fault,  or  improving  his  character, 
but  has  been  obliged  to  say,  "  To  will  is  present  with  me  ;  but  how 
to  perform  that  which  I  will,  I  find  not"?  Every  earnest  effort 
shows  us  more  plainly  how  deep  the  roots  of  evil  run  below  the 
surface.  We  find  a  law  in  the  members  wari'ing  against  the  law 
of  the  mind,  and  bringing  us  into  captivity  to  the  law  of  sin. 
This  is  the  description  which  Paul  gives  of  it.  It  is  a  laio ;  that 
is,  something  regular,  constant,  permanent  —  a  steady  stress,  a 
bias  towards  evil.  The  apostle,  however,  differs  from  the  writer  in 
placing  this  law,  not  in  the  will,  but  in  the  members  ;  and  also  in 
stating  that  there  is  another  law,  —  that  of  the  mind,  —  which  has  a 
tendency  towards  good.  In  the  unregcnerate  we  understand  him  to 
teach  that  the  law  of  evil  is  the  stronger,  and  holds  the  man,  the 
personal  will,  captive.  In  the  regenerate,  the  reverse  is  the  case. 
Nor  does  Paul  teach  that  this  sinful  tendency  is  guilt.  It  is  not 
"  O  guilty  man  that  I  am  !  "  but  "  O  toretched  man  that  I  am  !  " 

Now,  while  we  agree  with  the  writer  in  rejecting  as  superficial 
and  inadequate  any  theory  of  evil,  whether  emanating  from  our 
own  denomination  or  from  any  other,  which  does  not  recognize  this 
evil  state  or  tendency  lying  below  the  volitions,  we  differ  from  him 
in  that  we  think  it  not  always  a  nature,  but  a  character.  He  has 
not  proved,  nor  begun  to  prove,  that  this  dark  ground  of  evil  in 
man  is  always  innate  or  original.  It  may  or  may  not  be  ;  but  the 
argument  from  Christian  experience  shows  nothing  of  the  sort. 

The  writer's  fourth  and  remaining  argument  is,  that  the  Church 
has,  in  all  ages,  believed  in  a  sinful  nature,  as  distinguished  from 
conscious  transgressions.  If  this  were  so,  we  admit  that  it  should 
have  weight  in  the  inquiry  ;  but  we  deny  the  fact  so  far,  at  least, 
as  the  sinful  nature  is  concerned.* 

*  We  have  no  room  to  enter  into  an  examination  of  this  question  at  this 
time,  and  can  only  give  a  general  statement  on  this  subject  from  one  of  the 
authorities  which  happens  to  be  at  hand  :  — 

"  All  the  Fathers  "  (before  Augustine,  fourth  and  fifth  century)  "  differed 
from  Augustine  in  attributing  freedom  of  will  to  man  in  his  preseht  state. 
Thus  Justin  :  '  Every  created  being  is  so  constituted  as  to  be  capable  of  vice 
or  virtue.'  Cyril  of  Jerusalem :  '  Know  that  thou  hast  a  soul  possessed  of 
free  will;  for  thou  dost  not  sin  by  birth  {Kara  yivccii'),  nor  by  fortune,  but  we 
sin  by  free  choice.'  All  the  Latin  Fathers  also  maintained  that  free  will  was 
not  lost  after  the  fall.  The  Fathers  also  denied  in  part,  that  man  is  born  infected 
•with  Adam's  sin.  Thus  Athenagoras  says  in  Iiia  Apology,  '  Man  is  in  a  good 
state,  not  only  in  respect  to  his  Creator,  but  also  in  respect  to  his  natural 
generation.'  "  —  Wiggers,  Augustinism  and  Pelayianism.  Translated  by  Rev. 
Ralph  Emerson,  Professor  in  the  Theological  Seminary,  Andover,  Mass. 


460     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

The'  writer  proceeds  thus :  "  Assuming,  then,  that  the  fact  of  a 
sinful  nature  has  been  established,  we  pass  to  the  second  statement 
of  St.  Paul,  that  man  is  by  nature  a  child  of  wrath.  We  pass  from 
his  statement  that  sin,  in  its  ultimate  form,  is  a  nature,  to  his 
statement  that  this  nature  is  guilt."  If  we  have  done  justice  to 
the  writer's  arguments,  —  and  it  has  been  our  object  to  state  them 
fairly,  though  briefly,  —  we  submit  that  the  fact  of  a  sinful  nature 
has  not  been  established  by  them.  He  has  shown  that  in  man 
there  is  a  tendency  to  evil  running  below  the  conscious,  distinct 
volitions  — that  there  is  a  permanent  character,  good  or  evil, 
which  manifests  itself,  and  becomes  first  apparent  to  oui-selves,  or 
to  others,  in  these  separate,  spiritual  exercises  or  actions.  But 
that  this  stress  either  to  good  or  evil,  this  law  either  of  the  mind  or 
members,  is  original  and  inborn,  is  yet  to  be  proved.  Let  us  then 
consider  the  second  point,  namely,  whether  this  character  or  na- 
ture, whichever  it  may  be,  is  also  guilt. 

As  the  writer's  first  argument  to  prove  a  sinful  nature  was 
drawn  from  the  Greek  word  cpvaig,  so  his  first  argument  to  prove 
that  nature  guilt  is  derived  from  the  Greek  word  o?'/^  in  the  same 
passage.  "  The  apostle  teaches,"  he  says,  "that  sinful  man  is  a 
child  of  wrath.  Now,  none  but  a  guilty  being  can  be  the  object  of 
the  righteous  and  holy  displeasure  of  God."  But  this  word,  trans- 
lated ivrath,  is  confessedly  used  in  other  senses  besides  that  of  the 
divine  anger  or  displeasure.  It  may  mean  the  suft'erings  or  pun- 
ishments which  come  as  the  result  of  sin,  in  which  sense  it  is  used 
in  Matt.  3:7,"  Who  hath  warned  you  to  fiee  from  the  wrath  to 
come  ?  "  and  other  places.  This  word  is  used  in  the  passage  just 
quoted  for  some  future  evil;  in  John  3  :  36,  for  a  present  evil  — 
"  The  wrath  of  God  abides  on  him  ;  "  and  in  1  Thess.  2 :  16,  for  a 
past  evil  —  "  For  the  wrath  is  come  [lit.  has  come]  on  them  to  the 
uttermost."  It  may  mean  the  subjective  feeling  of  guilt ;  the 
sense  that  we  deserve  tlie  divine  displeasure,  which  is  removed  by 
the  assurance  of  forgiveness.  It  may  mean  the  state  of  alienation 
from  God,  which  results  by  a  law  of  the  conscience  from  this 
sense  of  guilt  —  an  alienation  removed  by  the  divine  act  by 
which  God  reconciles  the  sinner  to  himself.  And  the  radical 
meaning,  from  which  these  secondary  meanings  flow,  may  be  the 
essential  antagonism  existing  between  the  holy  nature  of  God  and 
all  evil.  But  whatever  it  means,  it  cannot  intend  anything  like 
human  anger.  In  the  divine  wrath  there  is  neither  selfishness  nor 
passion  ;  and  it  must  consist  with  an  infinite  love  towards  its  object. 
The  ■word,  therefore,  as  used  in  Eph.  2  : 3,  does  not  convey  the 


APPENDIX.  401 

idea  of  guilt,  a  vi  terviinis.  It  may  mean  as  well,  that  this  sinful 
tendency  in  man,  manifesting  itself  in  sinful  actions,  jjioduces  a 
state  of  estrangement  or  alienation  between  man  and  God.  How 
far  this  is  a  guilty  alienation,  and  how  far  it  is  evil  and  sorrowful, 
is  not  to  be  learned  from  the  term  itself. 

But  the  main  proof  of  the  writer  in  support  of  his  second  po- 
sition is  found  in  the  assertion,  that  this  sinful  tendency  in  man, 
out  of  which  evil  acts  continually  flow,  is  not  a  tendency  of  the 
physical  nature,  but  of  the  will  itself.  He  distinguishes  the  will 
proper  from  the  mere  foculty  of  single  choices,  and  considers  it  to 
be  a  deeper  power  lying  at  the  very  centre  of  the  soul,  which  de- 
termines the  whole  man  with  reference  to  some  great  and  unlimited 
end  of  living.  It  is,  in  fact,  the  man  himself —  the  person.  For 
man,  he  asserts,  is  not  essentiiilly  intellect  or  feeling ;  but  is  essen- 
tially and  at  bottom  a  will,  a  self-determhiing  creature.  "His 
other  faculties  of  knowing  and  feeling  are  grafted  into  this  stock 
and  root ;  and  hence  he  is  responsible  from  centre  to  circumfer- 
ence," He  then  affirms  the  will,  thus  defined,  to  be  the  responsi- 
ble and  guilty  author  of  the  sinful  nature  ;  being  nothing  more 
nor  less  than  its  constant  and  total  determination  to  self  as  the 
ultimate  end  of  living.  This  voluntary  power,  which  is  the  man 
himself,  has  turned  away  from  God  and  directed  itself  to  self  as  an 
ultimate  end;  and  this  state  of  the  will  is  the  sinful  nature  of  man. 

We  have  no  disposition  to  quarrel  with  the  psychology  of  this 
statement.  We  admit  man  to  be  essentially  will,  in  the  sense 
here  described.  He  is  essentially  activity;  an  activity  limited 
externally,  by  special  organization  and  circumstances,  —  limited 
internally,  by  quantity  of  force,  and  knowledge. 

Nor,  again,  do  we  deny  that  in  the  unregenerate  state  the  will 
of  man  is  directed  to  self  rather  than  to  God  as  its  ultimate  end ; 
and  that  this  is  guilt,  and  in  a  certain  sense  total  guilt.  No  man 
can  serve  two  masters.  If  he  is  obedient  to  one,  he  is  necessarily 
disobedient  to  the  other.  This  disobedience  may,  or  may  not,  ap- 
pear in  act ;  but  it  is  there  in  state.  He  whose  ultimate  end  is 
self-gratification  is  always  ready  to  sacrifice  the  will  of  God  to  his 
own.  He  whose  ultimate  end  is  God  is  always  ready  to  sacrifice 
his  own  will.  In  this  sense,  the  unregenerate  man  may  be  said  to 
be  wholly  sinful ;  and  he  who  is  born  of  God,  not  to  commit  sin. 

Thus  much  we  grant ;  and  the  admission  is  a  large  one.     But 
we  must  now  object  to  the  writer,  that  this  is  but  one  side  of  the 
question ;  and  that  he  has  omitted  to  see  the  other  side.     The 
39* 


462  ORTHODOXY  :    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

sources  of  evil  are  not  so  simple  as  he  seems  to  suppose ;  for  man 
is  a  very  complex  being,  and  the  world  in  which  he  lives  is  a  very 
complex  world.     We  therefore  would  inquire,  — 

What  proof  have  we  that  this  guilty  direction  of  the  will  is  a 
nature,  in  the  sense  claimed,  i.  e.,  something  innate  or  original  ? 
Why  may  not  the  will  have  been  turned  gradually  in  this  direction 
as  we  grow  up,  by  enticements  of  pleasure ;  and  why  might  not 
the  will,  in  like  manner,  by  means  of  wise  culture,  have  been 
gradually  directed  to  God  ? 

Again :  what  proof  have  we  that  we  are  so  wholly  unconscious 
of  this  direction  of  the  will,  as  our  author  contends?  That  a 
great  many  of  the  acts  of  the  will  are  unconscious  acts,  like  the 
separate  movements  of  the  finger  in  a  skilful  pianist,  or  lifting  of 
the  feet  in  walking,  we  admit ;  and  we  are  not  responsible  for  these 
separate  acts,  but  for  the  preceding  choice,  by  means  of  which 
we  determine  to  play  the  tune,  or  walk  the  mile.  In  like  manner, 
the  dii-ection  of  the  soul  to  self  rather  than  to  God  may  be  moral 
evil ;  but  is  not  moral  guilt,  until  we  become  conscious  of  it,  in  a 
greater  or  less  degree.  Then,  when  partially  or  wholly  awakened 
to  the  evil  direction  of  the  soul,  if  we  allow  ourselves  to  neg- 
lect this  discovery,  to  turn  away  from  the  fact  and  forget  it,  on 
that  conscious  act  presses  the  whole  burden  of  guilt,  and  not  on 
the  unconscious  volitions  which  may  result  from  it.  We  say, 
therefore,  in  opposition  to  the  writer,  that  though  there  may  be  de- 
pravity without  consciousness  of  the  depraved  state,  there  cannot 
be  guilt  without  consciousness  of  the  evil  choice,  or,  as  the  apos- 
tle says,  "  Sin  is  not  imputed  where  there  is  no  law." 

Again :  we  totally  dissent  from  the  statement  that  this  deep- 
lying  will  in  man  is  unable  to  obey  the  commands,  "  Turn  ye,  turn 
ye  from  your  evil  way,  for  why  will  ye  die  ?  "  —  "  Repent  and  be 
converted,  that  your  sins  may  be  blotted  out,"  —  "  Make  you  a  new 
heart  and  a  new  spirit,"  —  "  Choose  you  this  day  whom  you  will 
fserve,"  —  "  Believe  in  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  and  be  saved."  The 
writer  says,  that  "  such  a  power  as  this,  including  so  much,  and 
running  so  deep,  which  is  a  determination  of  the  whole  soul,  can- 
iiOt,  from  the  very  nature  of  the  case,  be  such  a  facile  and  easily 
managed  power  as  that  by  which  we  resolve  to  do  some  particular 
thing  in  every-day  life."  True  :  not  so  easily  managed ;  but  can  it 
not  be  managed  at  all  ?  It  may  require  more  self-examination  to 
understand  what  the  direction  of  the  will  is,  and  more  concentra- 
tion of  thought  and  will,  and  more  leaning  on  God's  help ;  but 


APPENDIX.  463 

tcith  all  these  are  we  able  oi-  not  able  to  turn  to  God?  He  says, 
the  great  main  tendency  of  the  will  to  self  and  sin  as  an  ultimate 
end,  tliough  having  a  free  and  criminal  origin,  "  is  not  to  be  re- 
versed so  easily."  True,  again ;  but  why  not  less  easily  ?  The 
writer  speaks  of  the  sinful  will  as  a  "  total  determination  of  itself 
to  self ;  "  and  asks  "  how  the  power  that  is  to  reverse  all  this  pro- 
cess can  possibly  come  out  of  the  will  thus  shut  up,  and  entirely 
swallowed  in  the  process.  How  is  the  process  to  destroy  itself?" 
But  what !  lias  man  become  a  process  ?  He  is  essentially  will, 
but  is  this  will  blind  mechanism  ?  Has  it  not,  according  to  our 
author's  own  theory,  intelligence,  conscience,  affection,  rooted  into 
it  ?  The  moment  that  the  writer  begins  to  speak  of  the  will,  as 
unable  to  change  its  direction,  he  is  compelled  to  conceive  of  it 
materially  and  mechanically,  and  not  as  the  moral,  responsible 
soul.  He  says,  "  The  human  will  becomes  a  current  that  becomes 
unmanageable  simply  because  of  its  own  momentum."  And  there- 
fore, again,  he  is  obliged  to  conceive  of  the  whole  voluntary  power 
as  lost,  and  lost  before  man  was  born  ;  and  he  reduces  all  our 
real  freedom  to  the  original  act  of  the  will  previous  to  birth, 
which  took  place  when  we  were  present  in  Adam's  soul,  and  com- 
mitted the  first  transgression  with  him. 

This  is  plainly  the  denial  of  all  human  freedom  since  the  fall 
of  Adam.  We  bring  into  the  world,  according  to  the  writer,  a 
will  wholly  and  inevitably  bent  to  evil.  We  have  no  conscious- 
ness of  this  tendency,  and  if  we  were  conscious  of  it  we  have  no 
power  to  change  it ;  but  we  yet  are  responsible  for  it,  and  guilty 
because  of  it,  inasmuch  as  we  began  this  state  ourselves  when  all 
our  souls  were  mystically  present  in  the  soul  of  Adam.  Of  this 
theory,  we  merely  say  now,  that,  if  it  be  true,  man  is  not  7ioto 
guilty  of  any  sin  which  he  commits  in  his  mortal  life  ;  for  he  is 
not  now  a  free  being.  He  is  only  responsible  for  the  sin  which  he 
freely  committed  in  Adam.  He  is  no  more  responsible  when  we 
suppose  his  sin  to  proceed  from  his  will,  than  when  we  suppose  it 
to  proceed  from  a  depraved  sensuous  nature,  or  from  involuntary 
ignorance,  for  he  is  no  more  free  in  the  one  case  than  in  the  other. 
He  may  be  an  infinitely  dei)raved  and  infinitely  miserable  being, 
but  he  can  in  no  true  sense  be  called  a  guilty  being.  Again  wa 
say,  if  this  theory  be  true,  it  is  an  awful  theory,  and  one  which 
we  cannot  possibly  reconcile  with  the  justice  or  goodness,  and  still 
less  with  the  fatherly  character,  of  God.  That  God  should  so 
have  constituted  human  nature  that  all  the  millions  of  the  human 


464    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

race  should  have  had  this  fatal  opportunity  of  destroying  them- 
selves utterly,  by  one  simultaneous  act,  in  Adam,  is,  to  say  the 
least,  an  awful  theory  to  propound  concerning  our  heavenly 
Father.  We  might  put  Christ's  argument  to  any  man  not  hard- 
ened by  theological  study,  as  it  seems  to  us,  with  irresistible 
force.  "  What  man  is  there  among  you,  BEING  A  father,"  who 
could  do  anything  of  this  sort  ?  But  we  know  too  well  that  all 
such  appeals  fall  harmless  from  the  sevenfold  shield  of  a  system- 
atized theology. 

Therefore  we  will  only  say  further,  concerning  this  theory, 
that,  as  being  apparently  in  direct  conflict  with  the  divine  attri- 
butes as  taught  in  the  New  Testament ;  as  making  man  a  mere 
process  deprived  of  real  freedom  ;  as,  proving  man  not  guilty  for 
any  sin  committed  in  this  life  ;  and  as  thereby  deadening  the  sense 
of  responsibility,  and  showing  that  we  cannot  possibly  obey  the 
command,  "  Repent  and  turn  to  God,"  —  this  theory  of  a  sin  com- 
mitted in  Adam  ought  to  have  the  amplest  proof  before  we  believe 
it.  We  admit  that  it  may  be  true,  though  opposed  to  all  oiu"  ideas 
of  God,  man,  and  duty.  But  being  thus  opposed,  it  ought  to  be 
sustained  by  the  most  unanswerable  arguments.  If  Jesus  and  his 
apostles  have  told  us  so  plainly,  we  will  believe  it  if  we  can. 
How  is  it,  then  ?  Not  a  word  on  the  subject  in  the  four  Gospels. 
Not  a  text  from  the  lips  of  Jesus  which  Can  be  pretended  to  lay 
down  any  such  theory.  He  does  not  even  mention  the  name  of 
Adam  once  in  the  Gospels,  nor  allude  to  him,  except  when  speak- 
ing of  marriage.  This  theory  rests,  not  on  anything  contained  in 
the  Gospels,  book  of  Acts,  or  Epistles  of  Peter,  James,  or  John, 
but  on  two  texts  in  two  Epistles  of  Paul  (Rom.  5  :  14 ;  1  Cor.  15  : 
22).  In  the  latter  passage  Paul  says  not  a  word  of  Adam's  sin, 
but  only  of  his  death,  —  the  whole  chapter  treating,  not  of  sin, 
but  of  death  and  the  resurrection.  This  passage,  therefore,  can 
hardly  be  considered  a  plain  statement  of  the  theory.  The  other, 
in  Romans,  is  confessedly  so  far  from  plain,  that  it  is  difficult 
to  make  it  agree  with  any  theory  ;  but  the  most  evident  mean- 
ing, to  one  who  has  no  theory  to  support,  is,  that  sin  began 
with  Adam,  and  the  consequences  of  sin,  which  are  moral  and 
physical  evil,  began  also  with  him ;  and  as  he  thus  set  in  motion 
a  series  of  evil  tendencies  which  we  find  in  our  organization, 
and  which  Paul  elsewhere  calls  the  law  of  the  members,  and 
a  series  of  evil  circumstances  which  we  find  around  us  in  the 
world,  both  of  which  are  the  occasion  of  sin,  we  may  trace  back 


APPENDIX.  465 

to  him  the  commencement  of  human  disobedience.  If  the  passage 
teaches  anything  more  than  this,  it  certainly  does  not  teach  it 
plainly  or  explicitly. 

§  4.  Defence  of  Everlasting  Punishment,  by  Dr.  Nehemiah 
Adams  and  Dr.  J.  P.  Thompson.  — Two  defences  of  this  dreadful 
doctrine  have  appeared  within  a  few  years  —  one  by  Rev.  Nehe- 
miah Adams,  1).  D.  (chiefly  known  by  his  many  and  determined 
pleas  for  slavery),  and  the  other  by  Dr.  Thompson  of  New  York. 

We  will  first  examine  Dr.  Adams's  tract  on  "The  Reasonable- 
ness of  Eternal  Future  Punishment." 

We  have  these  three  objections  to  it :  — 

I.  It,  throughout,  denies  the  sovereignty  of  God. 

II.  It  is,  throughout,  a  system  of  naturalism. 

III.  It,  throughout,  ignores  the  central  truth  of  the  gospel. 

It  is  our  business  to  substantiate  these  assertions  by  sufficient 
proof. 

1.  The  view  taken  in  his  tract,  of  God,  cannot  be  true,  because 
It  conflicts  with  his  supreme  and  sovereign  deity. 

Of  course,  this  is  to  dethrone  God.  God,  if  not  sovereign,  is  not 
God.  Any  view  which  disturbs,  however  remotely,  the  supremacy 
of  the  Deity,  must  be  a  relapse  towards  Pagan  idolatry.  We 
charge  this  tendency  on  the  whole  tenor  of  this  tract.  We  affirm 
that  it  seriously  impairs  that  confidence  and  strength  which  can 
only  come  from  reliance  on  Omnipotence,  and  remands  us  to  the 
terrors  and  narrowness  of  Polytheism  ;  not  consciously,  of  course, 
or  intentionally,  but  by  the  logic  of  its  ideas  and  the  tendency  of 
its  argument. 

According  to  Dr.  Adams's  view  of  the  world,  it  is  a  scene  of 
conflict  between  God  and  the  Devil.  The  prize  contended  for  is 
the  souls  of  men.  God  wishes  to  save  them :  the  Devil  wishes  to 
damn  them.  By  immense  eSbrts,  —  by  the  unparalleled  sacrifice 
of  himself  on  the  cross,  —  God  succeeds  in  saving  a  portion  of  this 
race,  whom  the  Devil  had  plunged  into  fearful  and  desperate  sin. 
As  for  the  rest,  He  can  do  nothing  with  them,  but  must  go  away 
and  leave  them;  escaping  with  the  saved  to  some  other  region, 
whei  e  the  sin  and  misery  of  the  rest  may  be  lost  sight  of. 

The  only  divine  supremacy  which  Dr.  Adams  admits  is  that  of 
force.  God  is,  on  the  whole,  stronger  than  the  Devil ;  so  that  He 
can  prevent  him  from  carrying  his  ravages  beyond  certain  limits. 
God  can  "  hem  in  and  overrule  "  the  power  of  sin  ;  but  he  cannot 
conquer  it.     He  has  no  complete  power  over  the  heai-t  and  will  of 


466     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

men  to  become  supreme  there  ;  but  he  has  power  over  their  con* 
duct,  and  can  restrain  that  within  certain  limits. 

God's  sovereignty,  according  to  Dr.  Adams,  is  only  like  that  of 
a  human  government,  and  that,  again,  a  weak  one.  A  human 
government  is  strong  when  it  is  able  to  dispense  with  standing 
armies,  with  an  omnipresent  police,  with  prisons  and  dungeons  :  it 
is  weak  when  its  authority  is  only  maintained  by  these.  In  the 
first  case,  it  rests  on  the  love  of  the  people ;  in  the  other  case, 
only  on  force. 

Now,  according  to  Dr.  Adams's  tract,  God's  sovereignty  is  es- 
sentially one  of  force.  He  is  not  sovereign  by  overcoming  sin 
through  his  own  holiness,  but  only  by  restraining  its  outbreaks  by 
externally  applied  force.  So  far  from  conquering  sin,  he  is  rep- 
resented as  giving  up  all  hope  of  conquering  it.  He  has  tried 
everything  in  his  power,  and  has  failed.  He  can  do  nothing  more. 
Dr.  Adams  speaks  of  God's  "  having  expended  upon  us  all  which 
the  gospel  of  his  grace  includes,"  and  of  "  the  failure  of  that  which 
is  the  brightness  of  his  glory."  Now,  Dr.  Adams  says,  "  What 
God  will  probably  do  is,  to  go  away  and  leave  us."  God  says,  ac- 
cording to  the  idea  of  this  tract,  "  I  will  place  all  of  you,  who  sin, 
in  a  world  by  yourselves,  from  which  I  and  my  friends  will  forever 
withdraw."  In  substance.  He  gives  up,  and  acknowledges  himself 
defeated.  He  is  beaten  by  sin,  which  is  more  powerful  than  his 
gospel.  Sin  compels  the  Deity  to  compromise  ;  to  take  some 
souls,  and  to  leave  others;  to  divide  the  universe,  —  love  reigning 
in  one  part  of  it,  hatred  and  wickedness  in  another. 

2.  The  second  objection  to  the  doctrine  of  everlasting  punishment, 
as  taught  in  these  works,  is,  that  it  is  a  system  of  pure  material- 
ism. It  is  naturalism,  as  opposed  to  supernaturalism.  All  its  ar- 
guments from  Scripture  interpret  Scripture  according  to  its"  letter, 
and  not  according  to  its  spirit.  While  much  stress  is  laid  on  the 
word  "  eternal,"  no  real  eternity  is  believed  in,  or  even  conceived 
of.  The  fundamental  law  of  religious  knowledge  —  namely,  that 
a  man  must  be  born  of  the  Spirit  in  order  to  see  the  kingdom  :  f 
God,  and  that  spiritual  things  must  be  spiritually  discerned  —  is 
wholly  lost  sight  of  The  spiritual  world,  with  its  bliss  and  its 
woe,  is  supposed  to  be  a  continuation  of  the  natural  world,  instead 
of  being  its  exact  opposite.  The  same  conditions  of  space  and 
time  are  supposed  to  prevail  there  as  here.  Hell  is  regarded  by 
Dr.  Adams  as  a  large  place,  located  in  some  remote  part  of  the 
universe,  where  the  suflferings  and  blasphemies  of  damned  souls 


APPENDIX.  467 

and  devils  will  not  disturb  the  sentimental  happiness  of  himself 
and  his  pious  companions.  Eternity  he  regards  as  an  enormous 
and  quite  inconceivable  accumulation  of  time,  instead  of  being  the 
very  negation  of  time.  An  unlimited  quantity  of  days,  months, 
and  years,  is  his  notion  of  eternity. 

In  like  manner,  all  the  arguments  by  which  the  school  to  which 
he  belongs  maintains  this  doctrine,  are  drawn  from  relations  which 
exist  in  this  world.  Great  use  is  made  of  the  analogies  of  human 
government.  It  is  said  that  it  would  not  be  safe  for  the  Deity  to 
forgive  sins  on  the  simple  condition  of  repentance,  without  an 
atonement,  because  it  would  not  be  safe  for  human  governments  to 
do  so.  The  government  of  God  is  made  wholly  similar  to  the  im- 
perfect and  ignorant  goverinnents  of  men.  When  we  say  that 
God,  as  described  in  the  New  Testament,  is  not  a  Being  to  inflict 
everlasting  suffering  hereafter,  we  are  told  that  he  inflicts  suffering 
here  ;  as  though  there  were  no  essential  distinction  between  the 
finite  and  the  infinite,  the  temporal  and  the  eternal.  When  we 
argue  that  God  would  not  suspend  the  eternal  destiny  of  a  soul 
upon  the  conduct  and  the  determination  of  a  brief  earthly  life,  we 
have  instances  given  us  of  great  risks  to  which  we  are  exposed, 
and  great  evils  which  we  may  incur,  in  this  world ;  as  though 
there  were  no  difl'erence  between  a  partial  loss  and  total  destruc- 
tion. When  we  say  that  the  justice  of  God  will  not  jjermit  him  to 
punish  everlastingly  those  who,  like  the  heathen,  have  never  know^n 
Christ,  we  have  instances  given  of  those  who  have  ignorantly 
burned  themselves  or  have  fallen  down  precipices.  In  'all  such 
examples,  these  reasoners  overlook  the  essential  distinction  between 
the  finite  and  the  infinite.  They  forget  that  all  finite  evil  can  be 
made  the  means  of  a  greater  ultimate  good,  but  that  infinite  evil 
cannot. 

It  is  a  curious  fact,  that  those  who  are  most  Orthodox  fall  most 
easily  into  a  very  hard  and  dry  naturalism.  God  is  to  them  a  king 
sitting  on  a  throne  in  some  far  heaven  outside  of  the  world,  not  a 
spirit  i)ervading  it  and  sustaining  it.  He  governs  men  from  with- 
0!Ut  by  offering  them  rewards  and  threatening  them  with  punish- 
inents,  not  by  inward  inspirations  and  influence.  He  teaches  them 
from  without  by  an  outward  Christ,  an  outward  Bible,  outward 
preachers,  pulpits,  creeds.  Sabbaths,  and  churches ;  not  by  Christ 
formed  within  us,  not  by  epistles  and  gospels  written  on  the 
fleshly  tables  of  the  heart.  The  day  of  judgment  is  a  particular 
time,  when  God  shall  sit  on  his  throne,  and  all  appear  before  him  ; 


4o8     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

not  the  perpetual  spiritual  sentence  pronounced  in  each  human 
soul  by  the  divine  law.  And  so  heaven  is  a  place  where  there  is 
to  be  some  singing  of  j^salms,  and  such  amusements  as  are  here 
considered  proper  in  Orthodox  families  ;  hell,  another  place,  where 
souls  are  shut  up,  to  suffer  from  physical  fire,  or  at  least  from 
some  external  infliction.  The  doctrine  taught  by  the  Saviour  in 
the  first  twelve  verses  of  his  first  sermon,  that  the  humble,  the 
generous,  the  merciful,  are  already  blessed,  and  have  heaven  now, 
does  not  appear  to  be  at  all  comprehended.  That  heaven  and  hell 
are  in  this  world  already  ;  that  truth,  love,  and  use  are  its  essence, 
whilst  falsehood  and  selfishness  are  the  essence  of  hell,  —  these, 
though  rudimental  facts  of  Christianity,  are  commonly  considered 
mere  mysticism.  But  those  who  do  not  see  all  this  have  not  seen 
the  kingdom  of  heaven,  and  must  be  born  again,  into  a  new  world 
of  spiritual  ideas,  in  order  to  see  it. 

3.  The  third  and  principal  argument  against  the  doctrine  of  ever- 
lasting punishment  is,  that  it  is  inconsistent  loith  the  divine  love 
to  his  creatures.  It  is  impossible  for  God  to  manifest  love  to  a 
human  being  by  inflicting  everlasting  torment  upon  him.  It  can- 
not do  him  good,  because,  according  to  this  theory,  the  period  of 
probation  is  i:)ast,  and  he  has  no  power  now  to  repent.  As  far, 
therefore,  as  the  man  himself  is  concerned,  it  is  gratuitous  suffer- 
ing —  torment  inflicted  without  any  purpose.  It  cannot  be  said 
that  God  has  any  love  for  the  soul  which  he  is  treating  in  this 
way.  He  has  cast  it  off.  To  that  soul,  nevermore,  throughout 
the  ages  of  an  everlasting  existence,  shall  God  appear  as  a  friend, 
but  always  as  an  enemy. 

We  sometimes  hear  of  a  father  who  disinherits  a  child  in  conse- 
.quence  of  some  act  of  disobedience.  In  one  of  the  most  touching 
tragedies  in  the  English  language,  a  father  refuses  to  forgive  his 
daughter  who  had  married  contrary  to  his  wishes.  He  leaves  her 
to  starve,  and  refuses  to  forgive  her  or  to  see  her.  No  one  ap- 
proves of  this  conduct  in  the  parent.  But  every  Orthodox  man, 
■who  believes  in  everlasting  punishment,  attributes  an  infinitely 
greater  cruelty  to  God ;  infinitely  greater,  because  the  obstinacy 
of  the  human  parent  endures  only  during  a  short  life,  but  tie 
severity  of  God  endures  forever. 

The  force  of  this  objection  is  such,  that  Dr.  Adams  has  felt 
obliged  to  add  to  his  tract  on  "  Everlasting  Punishment  "  another 
tract  upon  the  text,  "  God  is  love,"  endeavoring  to  show  a  con- 
sistency between  the  two.     But  he  does  this  by  substituting  some- 


APPENDIX.  469 

thing  else  in  the  place  of  the  last.  It  is  curious  enough,  that  a 
master  in  Israel  should  have  written  a  tract  upon  the  "  love  "  of 
God,  and  should  have  substituted  "  benevolence  "  instead  of  it.  In 
other  words,  instead  of  that  fatherly  love  to  every  individual  which 
is  the  essential  fact  revealed  in  the  gospel,  he  gives  us  a  general 
good-will  towards  the  human  race.  Such  a  general  benevolence  he 
finds  not  inconsistent  with  the  doctrine  of  everlasting  punishment ; 
for,  if  love  be  only  general  good-will,  then,  the  greatest  good  of 
the  greatest  number  being  the  object,  there  is  nothing  to  complain 
of  if  a  few  are  sacrificed  for  the  sake  of  the  rest.  It  is  not,  to  be 
sure  easy  to  see  how  those  who  have  safely  reached  glory,  and  are 
in  no  danger  of  relapse,  can  be  benefited  by  the  knowledge  that 
their  old  neighbors  and  friends  are  in  hell ;  but  there  may  be 
some  benefit  which  is  not  apparent.  By  quietly  substituting, 
therefore,  the  idea  of  benevolence  in  the  place  of  love,  the  difficulty 
may  be  evaded,  which  otherwise  is  unanswerable. 

But  what  an  entire  confusion  of  ideas  is  this,  which  substitutes 
a  general  benevolence  for  a  personal  affection,  good-will  towards 
the  race  for  love  to  the  individual !  It  is,  in  fact,  abolishing  the 
idea  of  Father,  and  substituting  that  of  Ruler.  The  kind  ruler, 
actuated  by  benevolence,  desires  the  good  of  all  his  subjects  ;  but 
he  does  not  love  them  as  individuals.  But  the  father  loves  the 
child  with  a  wholly  difi'crent  feeling.  The  tie  is  personal,  not 
general.  It  is  one  of  mutual  knowledge  and  mutual  dependence. 
We  cannot  love  one  whoiii  we  do  not  know ;  but  we  can  exercise 
benevolence  towards  him  very  easily.  Benevolence  depends  wholly 
on  the  character  of  the  benevolent  person ;  but  love  is  drawn  out 
by  the  object  loved.  I  do  not  love  my  child  because  I  am  benevo- 
lent, but  because  it  is  my  child.  The  infant  draws  forth  a  host  of 
feelings,  before  unknown,  in  the  mother's  heart.  She  does  not 
love  her  infant  because  she  is  a  benevolent  woman,  but  because  the 
infant  excites  her  love.  A  man  is  benevolent  towards  the  sufferers 
in  Kansas,  whom  he  has  never  seen  ;  but  he  does  not  love  them. 
He  loves  his  wife,  but  is  not  benevolent  towards  her.  Benevolence 
and  love,  therefore,  are  not  only  essentially  difi'crent  in  their 
nature,  origin,  and  manifestations,  but  so  different  as  often  to  ex- 
clude each  other. 

Now,  it  has  always  been  seen  that  God  is  benevolent.     This  is 

taught  by  natural  religion.     We  see  it  in  all  the  arrangements  of 

divine  Providence.     The  infinitely  varied  provisions  for  the  good 

of  his  creatures,  the  myriad  adaptations  by  which  their  wants  are 

40 


470     ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

met,  are  ample  evidence  of  this.  But  Christianity  comes  to  teach 
us  something  else,  —  to  teach  us  that  God  is  our  Father,  and  so 
to  see  in  him  benevolence  swallowed  up  in  love.  God  does  not 
love  his  children  because  he  is  benevolent,  but  because  they  are 
his  children.  He  does  not  love  them  for  the  sake  of  others,  but 
for  their  own  sake.  His  love  does  not  depend  upon  theii*  being 
good,  pious,  or  Christian  ;  it  depends  only  upon  the  fact  that 
they  are  his  children.  This  is  the  doctrine  of  the  prodigal  son ; 
in  which  wonderful  parable  it  is  more  distinctly  stated  than  in  any 
other  part  of  the  New  Testament.  The  doctrine  there  taaght, 
that  there  is  more  joy  in  heaven  over  one  sinner  who  repents  than 
over  ninety  and  nine  just  persons  who  need  no  repentance,  is  some- 
what different  from  that  other  doctrine,  that  the  redeemed  in 
heaven  look  down  with  joy  upon  the  sufferings  of  the  damned 
below.  This  parable  teaches  that  God  has  a  personal,  fatherly 
love  towards  the  impenitent  sinner  who  has  gone  away  from  him 
into  a  far  country.  The  father's  joy  when  his  child  returned  is 
the  evidence  of  the  love  which  had  continued  in  his  heart  while 
his  child  was  absent  from  him. 

This  being  the  character  ascribed  by  Christ  to  the  Deity,  we  as- 
sert that  it  is  wholly  inconsistent  with  the  doctrine  of  everlasting 
punishment  as  taught  in  the  pamphlet  before  us.  There  are,  it  is 
true,  many  widely  different  doctrines  to  which  the  term  "  eternal 
punishment  "  is  applied.  Some  of  these  may  not  be  inconsistent 
with  the  love  of  God.     Let  us  give  some  instances. 

Some,  by  eternal  punishment,  intend  tlie  punishments  of  eternity, 
as  distinguished  from  those  of  time.  They  mean  spii'itual  punish- 
ment, as  distinguished  from  temporal  punishment.  They  mean 
the  sufferings  which  have  their  root  in  the  sight  of  eternal  things, 
as  distinguished  from  those  which  originate  in  the  sense  of  earthly 
things  —  sufferings  which  come  to  us  from  within,  and  not  from 
without.  "  Eternal,"  in  this  sense,  describes  the  quality,  and  not 
the  quantity,  of  the  suffering ;  and  in  this  sense  eternal  punish- 
ment is  not  inconsistent  with  the  divine  love.  But  this  is  not  'he 
sense  which  Dr.  Adams  intends. 

Some  mean  by  endless  punishment,  that,  as  long  as  men  con- 
tinue to  sin,  they  wiU  continue  to  suffer ;  that  sin  is  eternally 
suffering.     But  this  is  not  the  sense  which  Dr.  Adams  intends. 

And  some  say  that  they  believe  in  eternal  punishment ;  mean- 
ing thereby,  that  the  consequences  of  sin  are  everlasting,  —  either 
positively,  by  leaving  forever  some    remorseful     sorrow   in    the 


APPENDIX.  471 

mind,  or  negatively,  by  leaving  men  forever  lower  down  in  the 
scale  of  excellence  and  happiness  than  they  would  otherwise  be. 
But  this  is  not  what  Dr.  Adams  means  by  it. 

And  some  men  believe  in  eternal  punishment  in  the  sense  of  a 
dark  background  to  the  universe,  which  will  always  continue,  a 
shadow  as  permanent  as  light,  —  necessary  for  the  full  perfection 
and  beauty  of  an  infinite  divine  creation.  Into  this  shadow  man 
may  forever  plunge  ;  out  of  it  he  may  forever  emerge  :  and  it 
will  always  continue  so  to  be.  But  this  is  not  the  view  taken  by 
Dr.  Adams. 

The  view  which  Dr.  Adams  takes  is  of  endless  punishment  in- 
flicted as  a  consequence  of  temporal  sin  committed  in  this  life. 
There  will  be  no  opportunity  to  repent  hereafter,  no  pardon  off'ered. 
Tliere  is  nothing  done  by  God,  after  this  life,  to  save  men.  The 
heathen  who  have  never  heard  of  Christ,  unconverted  infants,  those 
who  have  been  brought  up  in  the  midst  of  evil,  and  heretics  who 
do  not  accept  the  theory  of  Calvin  concerning  Christianity,  are  to 
be  toi'mented  forever  in  the  other  world.  This  view  he  thinks  not 
only  scriptural,  but  reasonable.  It  corresponds  nearly  to  the 
human  penalty  of  imprisonment  for  life  ;  except  that,  instead  of  a 
few  years  of  earthly  life,  it  is  a  never-ending  existence  ;  and, 
instead  of  simple  imprisonment,  it  is  imprisonment  with  torture 
added. 

We  are  accustomed  to  complain  of  the  "  horrors  of  the  Inquisi- 
tion ; "  but  wherein  do  they  differ  in  principle  from  the  doctrine  of 
Dr.  Adams  ?  The  inquisitors  tortured  men  for  heresy  ;  Dr. "Adams 
thinks  that  God  will  do  the  same.  The  power  of  the  Inquisition, 
however,  was  limited,  on  the  princi])le.  Dolor,  si  dura,  brevis ;  si 
longa,  levis.     But  not  so  with  everlasting  punishment. 

That  this  view  is  absolutely  inconsistent  with  the  fatherly  love 
of  God  to  every  soul,  is  apparent.  It  would  be  impossible  for  a 
father  to  torment  his  child  forever  in  consequence  of  temporal 
sin.  No  earthly  parent  could  be  found  cruel  enough  to  inflict  a 
milhon  years  of  torture  upon  his  child  for  each  sin  committed  by 
him  ;  but  a  million  years  for  every  sinful  action  would  be  but  a 
trifling  penalty  compared  with  everlasting  punishment. 

As  it  is  absolutely  impossible  to  defend  this  doctrine  on  the 
ground  of  the  fatherly  love  of  God,  it  is  defended  by  Dr.  Adams 
and  his  companions  on  other  grounds,  namely,  of  the  divine 
benevolence,  and  the  duty  of  God  as  a  governor.  The  argument 
is  this  :  If  God  was  dethroned,  all  sorts  of  evil  would  ensue.     But 


472  ORTHODOXY:    ITS    TRUTHS    AND    ERRORS. 

sin  is  always  endeavoring  to  dethrone  God  ;  therefore  it  is  his  duty 
to  use  the  most  strenuous  measures  to  prevent  this  result.  These 
strenuous  measures  consist  in  the  highest  rewards  offered  to 
obedience,  and  the  severest  punishments  threatened  to  disobedi- 
ence. But  no  punishment  is  so  severe  as  everlasting  punishment ; 
therefore  the  benevolence  of  God  requires  him  to  threaten  it ;  and, 
if  threatened,  his  truth  requires  him  to  inflict  it.  This  is  the  sort 
of  argument  by  which  the  doctrine  is  defended.  Its  fallacies  are 
manifest.  It  is  based  on  a  sort  of  Manicheism,  making  evil  a 
hostile  power  in  the  universe,  which  threatens  the  supremacy  of 
God.  It  makes  God  in  danger  of  outward  overthrow  in  consequence 
of  the  external  assaults  of  sin.  But  we  have  always  sujjposed  that 
the  essence  of  sin  was  the  state  of  the  heart,  and  the  evil  of  sin  to 
consist  in  the  estrangement  of  the  heart  from  God,  and  not  in  any 
danger  that  Omnipotence  would  be  dethroned  by  it.  Besides, 
though  the  fear  of  future  punishment  may  restrain  the  outward 
act,  it  cannot  change  the  heart,  and  cannot,  therefore,  remove  the 
real  evil  of  sin.     Here  is  the  fallacy  of  this  whole  argument. 

Another  weak  point  in  the  argument  for  everlasting  punishment 
regards  its  proof,  that  all  opportunity  for  repentance  is  confined 
to  this  life.  Only  two  or  three  texts  are  quoted  in  proof  of  this 
very  important  position.  One  is  taken  from  the  book  of  Ecclesi- 
astes,  and  declares,  that,  "  in  the  place  where  the  tree  falleth,  there 
it  shall  be  ;  "  of  which  there  is  no  evidence  that  it  has  any  relation 
to  the  subject ;  or,  if  it  has,  that  it  carries  the  least  authority  with 
it.  Another  passage  asserts  that  "  there  is  no  work,  nor  device, 
nor  knowledge,  nor  wisdom,  in  the  grave  whither  thou  goest." 
But  this  would  prove  too  much  ;  for  it  would  prove  that  there  was 
no  knowledge  in  the  other  life.  Another  passage,  quoted  by  Dr. 
Adams  from  the  book  of  Revelation,  says,  "  Let  him  that  is  un- 
just be  unjust  still ;  "  from  which  it  is  inferred  that  men  have  no 
ojjportunity  hereafter  for  repentance.  But,  as  this  is  said  to  those 
who  are  in  this  world  waiting  for  the  coming  of  Christ,  it  also 
proves  too  much,  if  taken  literally ;  since  it  would  declare  that 
men  cannot  repent  even  in  this  world.  Such  is  the  extremely 
slight  foundation  on  which  this  essential  part  of  the  doctrine  is 
made  to  rest.  Never  was  there  so  weak  a  support  for  so  impor- 
tant a  position. 

The  arguments  from  reason,  by  which  our  writer  supports  this 
part  of  his  doctrine,  are  all  taken  from  the  plane  of  the  lowest 
naturalism.     He  thinks  it   reasonable  that  the   Almighty  should 


APPENDIX.  473 

suspend  the  everlasting  destiny  of  his  creatures  upon  what  they 
do  or  omit  doing  in  tliis  life,  because  men,  in  earthly  transactions, 
adopt  a  similar  principle.  A  railroad  train  is  advertised  to  start 
at  a  certain  hour.  If  we  are  there  a  minute  too  late,  we  lose  our 
opportunity  of  going  on  an  important  journey.  We  think  this 
reasonable ;  why,  then,  argues  Dr.  Adams,  should  we  think  it 
unreasonable  for  God  to  make  us  lose  our  cliance  throughout 
eternity  if  we  do  not  take  the  opportunity  during  life  ?  God  has 
given  us  full  notice,  he  says,  of  his  intention ;  we  have  been  duly 
notified ;  and,  after  due  notice,  it  is  thought  reasonable,  in  eartlily 
business  transactions,  for  jjcople  to  run  their  chance.  A  man  may 
commit  a  crime  in  a  minute,  for  which  he  is  sentenced  to  imprison- 
ment for  life  or  to  capital  punishment.  We  think  this  reasonable ; 
why  should  we  think  it  unreasonable  that  God  should  send  men 
to  an  everlasting  hell  in  consequence  of  sin  committed  in  a  short 
lifetime  ? 

All  these  arguments  are  fallacious,  because  they  apply  to  the 
infinite,  conditions  belonging  wholly  to  the  finite ;  because  they 
transfer  to  Him,  whose  ways  are  not  as  our  ways,  and  whose 
thoughts  are  not  as  our  thoughts,  the  poor  necessities  of  human 
ignorance  and  weakness.  To  those  who  reason  thus,  the  Almighty 
may  say,  "  Thou  thoughtest  me  altogether  such  a  one  as  thou 
thyself."  It  is  because  man  is  weak  and  ignorant  that  he  is 
obliged  to  live  under  these  limitations.  If  we  were  able  to  do 
difierently,  we  should  not  make  such  severe  consequences  flow 
from  human  ignorance  and  weakness.  We  do  such  things,  not 
because  we  think  tliem  absolutely  just  and  good,  but  because  we 
cannot  help  it.  To  argue  that,  because  it  is  reasonable  for  human 
weakness  to  do  something  which  it  cannot  help,  it  is  reasonable 
for  divine  Omnipotence  to  do  an  infinitely  more  injurious  thing  of 
the  same  kind,  is  to  fly  in  the  face  of  all  logic  and  reason. 

Men  make  a  rule,  that,  if  I  am  not  at  the  station  when  the  train 
starts,  I  shall  lose  my  trip  for  that  day.  Yes  ;  but  suppose  the 
rule  should  be,  that,  if  I  arrived  a  moment  too  late,  I  should  be 
crucified.  Sujjpose  a  father  should  give  full  notice  to  liis  children, 
that,  whenever  any  of  them  misi)ronounced  a  word,  he  should  be 
burned  alive.  But  it  is  easier,  according  to  Dr.  Adams's  theory, 
for  a  child  never  to  make  a  mistake,  than  not  to  commit  the  sins 
for  which  it  is  to  be  punished  with  everlasting  torment.  "  What 
man  among  you  is  there,  being  a  father,"  who  would  cause  his 
children  to  come  into  the  world  e.\posed  to  such  fearful  risks ; 
40* 


474     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

who  would  allow  them  to  be  born  with  constitutions  tending  in- 
evitably to  sin,  the  inevitable  consequence  of  which,  after  a  few 
short  years  of  life,  is  never-ending  torment,  the  only  possible  es- 
cape from  which  is  salvation  through  a  Being  of  whom  the  majority 
never  heard,  according  to  a  system  which  the  majority  cannot 
believe,  and  by  a  process,  which,  except  by  a  special  help,  none  of 
them  are  able  to  accomplish  ?  We  should  say,  that  ive  would  not 
have  children  under  these  conditions.  It  were  better  that  such 
children  had  never  been  born.  If  we  then,  being  evil,  would  not 
subject  our  children  to  such  risk,  how  much  less  would  our  Father 
in  heaven  do  anything  of  the  kind  ! 

The  reply  to  such  arguments,  by  those  whom  Thomas  Burnet 
calls  the  "  unmerciful  doctors  "  and  "  ferocious  theologians,"  is 
always  the  same.  Because  finite  evil  exists,  and  is  not  inconsist- 
ent with  the  divine  plan,  therefore  infinite  evil  may  also  exist,  and 
not  be  inconsistent  with  the  divine  plan.  Because  one  may  sufi"er 
for  a  time  in  this  world,  therefore  he  may  be  compelled  to  sufi'er 
forever  in  the  other  world.  It  is  assumed  that  there  is  no  essen- 
tial distinction  between  time  and  eternity,  between  finite  and  in- 
finite evil.  Here  is  the  immense  fallacy  of  the  argument.  The 
difference  is  simply  this :  All  finite  suffering,  however  great,  is  as 
nothing  when  compared  with  everlasting  happiness  afterwards  ;  but 
all  finite  happiness,  however  great,  is  as  nothing  when  compared 
with  everlasting  suff"ering  afterwards.  If  we  deny,  therefore,  the 
doctrine  of  everlasting  sufi'ering,  evil  virtually  disappears  from  the 
universe  ;  if  we  accept  it,  good  virtually  disappears,  as  far  as  the 
sufferers  are  concerned.  If  all  evil  is  finite,  the  goodness  of  God 
can  be  fully  justified ;  but,  if  to  any  one  it  is  infinite,  no  such 
theodicy  is  possible. 

This  is  the  fatal  objection  to  the  doctrine  of  everlasting  punish- 
ment. It  clouds  the  face  of  the  heavenly  Father  with  impenetra- 
ble gloom.  It  takes  away  the  best  consolations  of  the  gospel. 
When  Jesus  tells  us  to  forgive  our  enemies,  that  we  may  be  like 
our  heavenly  Father,  who  sends  his  blessings  upon  the  evil  and  the 
good,  this  doctrine  adds,  that  God's  character  is  thus  forgiving  only 
in  this  world  ;  but  that,  in  the  other  world,  he  will  torment  his 
enemies  forever  in  hopeless  suffering.  When  we  seek  consolation 
amid  the  griefs  and  separations  of  this  world  by  looking  to  a  bet- 
ter world,  where  all  tears  will  be  wiped  away,  we  have  presented 
to  us  instead  this  awful  vision  of  unmitigated  horror.  Instead  of 
finite  evil  being  swallowed  up  into  infinite  good,  it  darkens  down 
into  infinite  woe. 


APPENDIX.  475 

Dr.  Adams  quotes  Thomas  Burnet,  Master  of  the  Charter-liouse, 
as  a  striking  instance  of  one,  who,  though  he  denied  or  doubted 
this  doctrine,  admitted,  nevertheless,  that  the  Scriptures  were 
probably  against  him.  He  quotes  him  correctly  as  saying,  "  Hu- 
man nature  shrinks  from  the  very  name  of  eternal  punishment ; 
yet  the  Scriptures  seem  to  hold  the  other  side."  Though  Dr. 
Adams  gives  the  Latin,  and  refers  to  the  ])age  of  the  book,  let  us 
hope,  for  his  own  sake,  that  he  quotes  it  at  second-hand  ;  which, 
as  he  twice  misspells  the  name,  is  not  unlikely  ;  for  Dr.  Burnet,  so 
far  from  admitting  that  the  Scriptures  are  "  probably  against  him," 
concludes,  after  an  examination  of  the  leading  passages,  that  they 
prove  nothing  certainly  as  to  the  eternal  duration  of  future  punish- 
ment. He  quotes  the  passage  in  wliich  the  Jewish  servant  is  said  to 
become  a  sh\e  J'orever,  —  meaning  till  the  year  of  jubilee  ;  in  which 
circumcision  is  called  an  everlasting  covenant,  —  meaning  that  it 
shall  be  abolished  by  the  same  divine  authority  ;  in  which  the  land 
of  Canaan  was  given  for  an  everlasting  possession  to  Abraham  and 
his  seed,  from  which  they  have  long  since  been  expelled ;  &c.  Dr. 
Burnet  does,  indeed,  say  that  the  Scriptures  see77i  to  favor  the  doc- 
trine he  opposes  ;  but  he  then  goes  on  to  show  that  such  is  not 
the  case.  He  also  "  awakens  antiquity,"  and  calls  to  his  aid  the 
merciful  doctors  of  the  early  church  (Justin  Martyr,  Jerome,  the 
Gregories,  Szc.)  to  support  his  hope  in  a  merely  limited  future  suf- 
fering. 

We  will  now  consider  the  meaning  of  some  of  the  texts  usually 
adduced  in  support  of  this  doctrine.  Of  these  texts,  there  are 
some  six  or  seven  only  upon  which  much  stress  is  laid ;  and  of 
these  the  principal  ones  are  as  follows  :  — 

1.  Matt.  18:  8,  "Having  two  eyes,  two  hands,"  &c.,  "to  be 
cast  into  hell  fii'e,"  or  "  into  everlasting  fire  "  (to  tivq  id  uidiriov)  — 
(ttjj'  yievuv  loO  nvQo;). 

2.  Matt.  25  :  46,  "  These  shall  go  away  into  everlasting  (eter- 
nal) punishment,  but  the  righteous  into  hfe  eternal  {y.oluaiv 
alihiioi'  and  twjjj'  ulwrtop).  The  same  adjective  is  used  in  both 
places  here,  in  the  Greek  ;  but  our  translators  have  seen  fit  to  ren- 
der it  "  everlasting  "  in  the  first  place,  and  "  eternal  "  in  the  sec- 
ond. There  is  no  authority  for  such  a  diSerent  translation.  The 
word  xolaaig,  translated  "  punishment,"  occurs  in  one  other 
place  in  the  New  Testament:  this  is  (1  John  4:  18),  "Perfect 
love  casteth  out  fear,  because  fear  hath  torment."  In  this  last  in- 
stance, it  is  evident  that  the  idea  of  punishment  is  not  fouud,  but 


476     OKTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

only  that  of  suffering.  In  the  LXX.  (Ezek.  14 :  3,  4,  7)  it  is 
translated  "  stumbling-block,"  and  means,  says  Schleusner  (Lexi- 
con in  LXX.),  "  all  that  is  the  source  of  misfortune  or  suffering." 
Donnegan  gives  as  its  meaning,  "  the  act  of  clipping  or  prunuig ; 
generally,  restriction,  restraint,  reproof,  check,  chastisement ;  lit. 
and  met.,  punishment." 

The  true  translation  of  the  passage,  then,  is,  — 

"  These  shall  go  away  into  the  sufferings  or  punishments  of  eter- 
nity ;  and  the  righteous,  into  the  life  of  eternity." 

The  simple,  direct,  and  natural  meaning,  therefore,  of  this  pas- 
sage is,  that,  besides  temporal  joy  and  suffering,  there  are  eternal 
joy  and  suffering :  besides  the  joys  and  sufferings  which  have  their 
root  in  time  and  in  temporal  things,  there  are  j.'>ys  and  sufferings 
which  have  their  root  in  eternity  and  in  eternal  things.  In  the 
twenty-fifth  chapter  of  Matthew,  the  sufferings  of  eternity  are  de- 
scribed as  following  dii-ectly  upon  judgment,  and  as  being  its  nat- 
ural consequence.  The  judgment  on  each  soul  consists,  according 
to  this  passage,  in  showing  it  its  real  character.  Both  the  good  and 
the  bad  are  represented  as  needing  such  a  judgment  as  this. 
Until  the  judgment  takes  place,  men  are  described  as  being  igno- 
rant of  the  true  nature  of  their  own  past  conduct.  They  do  not 
know  their  own  good  or  their  own  evil :  they  do  not  understand 
themselves  as  they  really  are.  They  have  done  good  and  bad  ac- 
tions, but  have  not  understood  the  value  of  those  actions.  They 
have  not  seen,  that  in  every  deed  of  charity,  in  every  act  of  hum- 
ble benevolence,  they  were  helping  Christ  and  his  cause.  They 
have  not  understood,  that,  by  every  selfish  and  cruel  deed,  they 
were  injuring  their  Master.  But  the  judgment  reveals  all  this  to 
them,  and  lifts  them  immediately  out  of  temporal  joy  or  pain 
into  eternal  joy  or  pain.  They  rise  out  of  temporal  things  into 
eternal  things,  and  the  new  insight  is  to  them  a  source  of  spiritual 
joy  or  spiritual  sufi'ering. 

In  some  instances,  if  almuog  were  translated  "  everlasting  "  or 
"  never-ending,"  it  would  make  such  palpable  nonsense,  that  our 
translators  have  been  obliged  to  give  it  an  entirely  different  ren- 
dering. Thus  (2  Tim.  1:9;  Tit.  1  :  2)  we  have  the  phrase  ngd 
xgdrnv  aiai'io)^  ;  which  would  be,  literally,  "before  eternitv,"  or 
"  before  everlasting  time  began,"  according  to  the  common  render- 
ing. They  have,  therefore,  translated  it  •'  before  the  world  began." 
In  the  same  way  (Matt.  24:  3;  1  Cor.  10:  11),  they  are  obliged 
to  change  their  usual  rendering,  or  they  would  have  to  say,  "  So 


APPENDIX.  477 

shall  it  be  at  the  end  of  forever ; "  or,  "  The  ends  of  eternity 
have  arrived." 

Mark  9  :  43-50,  it  is  said  that  the  "  worm  does  not  die  "  in  Ge- 
henna, and  "  the  fire  is  not  quenched."  This,  therefore,  is  thought 
to  teach  the  doctrine  of  never-ending  punishment  hereafter ;  but 
this  was  a  proverbial  expression,  taken  from  the  book  of  Isaiah. 

Chap.  66  :  24,  the  ])rophet  says,  that,  in  the  times  of  the  Mes- 
siah, all  men  shall  come,  and  worship  in  the  presence  of  Jehovah ; 
and  shall  then  go  out,  and  look  upon  the  dead  bodies  of  the  men 
who  had  transgressed  against  the  Lord  ;  "  for  their  worm  shall 
not  die,  neither  shall  their  fire  be  quenched  ;  and  they  shall  be  an 
abhorring  unto  all  tiesh."  Our  Saviour,  therefore,  is  not  making  an 
original  doctriiial  sUUement,  but  he  is  quoting  from  Isaiah.  Now, 
the  passage  in  Isaiah  refers,  not  to  ])unishment  of  the  soul  here- 
after, but  to  the  destruction  of  the  bodies  of  transgressors  in  the 
valley  of  Hinnom.  The  fire  and  the  worms  in  that  valley  were 
not  everlasting  in  any  strict  sense.  When  Isaiah  says,  "  Their 
worm  shall  not  die,  nor  their  fire  be  quenched,"  he  expresses 
merely  the  utter  destruction  which  would  fall  upon  them.  The 
fire  and  the  worms  of  the  valley  of  Hinnom  have  long  since  disap- 
peared ;  but,  while  the  fii'e  lasted,  it  was  the  emblem,  to  the  Jews, 
of  the  destruction  which  was  to  fall  upon  those  who  resisted  the 
will  of  Jehovah.  But  it  is  not  to  be  supposed  that  the  idea  of 
eternity,  which  is  not  in  the  original  image,  should  be  added  in  the 
figure.  The  fire  and  the  worms  were  to  last  in  the  valley  of  Hin- 
nom as  long  as  there  were  idolaters  to  be  punished  for  their  idola- 
try ;  and  so  the  spiritual  suffering  consequent  upon  sin  lasts  as  long 
as  sin  lasts.  Sin  is  perpetual  misery  ;  conscience  is  a^vorm  which 
never  dies  ;  bad  passions  are  a  fire  Avhich  is  never  extinguished. 
This  is  the  simj)le  and  natural  meaning  of  this  passage. 

3.  Matt.  26  :  24.  In  this  passage,  as  it  stands  in  our  translation, 
Jesus  says  concerning  Judas,  "  Woe  to  that  man  by  whom  the 
Son  of  man  is  betrayed  !  It  were  good  for  that  man  if  he  had  never 
been  born."  (Mark  14 :  21.)  The  argument  is,  that,  if  it  were 
good  for  Judas  not  to  have  been  born,  it  must  be  impossible  that 
he  should  ever  repent  and  be  saved  ;  because,  if  he  should  ever  be 
saved,  and  his  punishment  should  cease  (though  at  ever  so  remote 
a  period),  it  would  be  better  for  him  to  have  been  born  than  not 
to  have  been  born  ;  since  there  would  remain  an  eternity  of  hap- 
piness to  be  enjoyed  afterwards.  And  if  this  be  true  of  Judas,  it 
may  be  also  true  of  others. 


478         orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

Biit,  in  reply  to  this  argument,  we  say,  — 

1.  The  translation  is  doubtful.  The  literal  translation  is,  "  Woe 
to  that  man  by  whom  the  Son  of  man  is  betrayed !  It  had  been 
good  for  him  if  that  man  had  never  been  born."  This  is  the  literal 
rendering  of  the  Greek ;  and  the  apparent  meaning  seems  to  be, 
"  that  it  had  been  good  for  the  Son  of  man  if  Judas  had  not  been 
born."  Jesus  seems  to  say  that  it  is  a  great  woe  to  him,  a  great 
sorrow,  to  be  betrayed  by  one  of  his  own  friends,  by  a  member  of 
his  own  household.  It  would  have  been  good  for  Jesus,  if  this 
traitor,  who  was  to  wound  his  heart  so  deeply,  had  never  existed. 

2.  But,  retaining  our  present  translation,  the  natural  application 
of  it  is  to  this  life.  It  means  simply  this  :  The  earthly  life  of  this 
man  is  an  entire  failure.  His  life  is  wholly  thrown  away.  He  had 
better  never  have  been  in  the  world,  than  to  stand,  as  he  will  to  all 
time,  a  monument  of  the  basest  treachery.  The  idea  of  the  future 
life  does  not  come  in  at  all  here. 

On  the  whole,  one  must  feel,  in  reading  these  books  and  tracts, 
that  such  writers  are  more  to  be  pitied  than  to  be  blamed. 
Confined  in  the  strait-jacket  of  an  austere  theology  ;  steeped  to  the 
lips  in  Calvinism ;  working  painfully  all  his  life  in  sectarian  har- 
ness ;  with  an  angry  heaven  over  his  head,  and  a  ruined  earth 
about  his  feet ;  his  friends  and  neighbors  dropping  into  hell  by 
thousands  every  year ;  never  having  had  any  real  sight  of  the 
blessed  face  of  Jesus  ;  having  for  them  no  hope  full  of  immortality, 
but,  instead  thereof,  a  terror  full  of  damnation,  —  even  a  kindly 
nature  and  an  affectionate  heart  must  suffer,  be  dwarfed  and 
cripjiled. 

It  is  not  an  agreeable  task  to  refute  such  errors  ;  but  believing 
them  equally  destructive,  in  their  tendency,  to  piety  and  morali- 
ty, —  corrupting  the  Christian  life  at  its  centre,  and  weakening  its 
chief  source  of  power,  —  we  feel  it  a  duty  not  to  be  avoided.  Ad- 
vancing age  does  not  make  us  conservative  in  regard  to  such  doc- 
trines. The  longer  we  live,  the  more  we  see  of  their  evil  tendency. 
When  young,  we  shrank  from  attacking  them,  fearing  lest  they 
might  contain  some  truth  beyond  the  range  of  our  limited  ex- 
perience. But,  having  come  to  see  wherein  the  essence  of  Chris- 
tian truth  lies  in  all  varieties  of  pious  experience,  we  know  that 
this  doctrine  is  an  excrescence,  weakening  always  the  vital  power 
of  the  gospel.  It  rests  on  custom,  on  cowardice,  on  the  fear  of 
change,  not  on  any  positive  insight  or  substantial  knowledge. 
But,  as  Tertullian   declared  of  another  doctrine  defended  by  pre- 


APPENDIX.  479 

cedent,  "Christ  did  not  say,  'I  am  the  Custom,'  but,  'I  am  the 
Truth.'  " 

The  time  will  come  in  which  the  Christian  Church  will  look  back 
upon  its  past  belief  in  this  doctrine  as  it  looks  back  now  on  its 
former  universal  belief  in  the  duty  of  persecution,  the  jjrimacy  of 
the  pope,  or  the  atonement  made  by  Christ  to  Satan.  It  will  re- 
gard it  with  the  horror  with  which  it  now  regards  its  former  uni- 
versal conviction,  that  God  was  pleased  when  his  children  burned 
each  other  alive  for  difference  of  opinion.  We  now  shudder  when 
we  hear  of  "An  Act  of  F.\ith,"  consisting  in  burning  at  the 
stake  ten  or  twenty  Jews  and  Protestants.  Our  children  will 
shudder  with  a  still  more  inward  grief  that  we  could  make  it  an 
act  of  faith  to  believe  that  God  burns  millions  of  his  own  children 
in  unquenchable  fire  forever  because  they  deny  Calvin's  view  of 
the  atonement,  or  the  Church  definition  of  the  Trinity,  or  because 
of  any  possible  amount  of  sin  committed  in  this  world. 


We  now  proceed  to  add  some  remarks  upon  a  recent  work  by 
Dr.  Thompson  of  New  York,  a  zealous  and  favorite  disciple  of  the 
late  Dr.  Taylor  of  New  Haven.  This  book,  the  title  of  which  is, 
"  Love  and  Penalty,"  consists  of  nine  lectures  delivered  in  the 
Broadway  Tabernacle. 

With  the  contents  of  some  of  the  chapters  we  have  nothing  to 
do.  All  the  arguments  for  retribution,  derived  from  the  nature 
of  God,  the  nature  of  man,  the  course  of  Providence,  the  demerit 
of  sin,  have  for  their  object  to  prove  what  all  Christians  fully  be- 
lieve. Unitarians  and  Universalists,  Theodore  Parker  and  R.  W. 
Emerson,  teach  retribution,  present  and  future,  with  a  force  which 
leaves  little  need  of  additional  arguments  from  Orthodoxy.  They 
teach  a  perfect  and  inevitable  retribution,  proceeding  both  from  the 
truth  and  goodness  of  God,  by  means  of  which  every  man  reaps  as 
he  sows.  Orthodoxy,  they  complain,  teaches  no  such  full  and  per- 
fect retribution.  All  that  part  of  this  volume,  therefore,  which  is 
intended  to  show  the  probability  of  retribution,  is  wasted,  so  far  as 
any  opposers  are  concerned.  In  this  part  of  his  book.  Dr.  Thomp- 
son fights  as  one  who  beats  the  air.  He  is  very  zealous  to  dis- 
prove that  which  no  one  asserts,  to  prove  that  which  no  one 
denies,  and  to  show  the  folly  of  a  position  which  no  one  assumes. 

The  confusion  referred  to  runs  through  the  whole  book  ;  and 
perhaps  there  is  no  better  illustration  than  this  volume  presents 
of  that  logical  fallacy  which  is  called  "  the  irrelevant  conclusion." 


480     OETHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

This'  fallacy  consists  in  proving  one  thing,  and  making  men  think 
you  have  proved  another.  Dr.  Thompson's  hearers  saw  that  he 
proved  future  retribution,  and  thought  that  he  proved  eternal  pun 
ishment.  We  do  not  suppose  that  he  intended  to  sophisticate 
them :  the  difficulty  seems  rather  to  be,  that  he  has  sophisticated 
himself  The  ignoratio  elenchi  is  in  his  own  mind.  He  thinks, 
because  he  sees  penalty,  that  he  has  seen  vengeance  ;  that,  because 
he  has  established  retribution,  he  has  demonstrated  everlasting 
punishment. 

A  reasoner  has,  no  doubt,  a  perfect  right  to  try  to  prove  two  dis- 
tinct and  independent  propositions ;  but  he  must  keep  them  dis- 
tinct and  independent,  and  not  pretend  to  be  proving  one  when  he 
is  proving  the  other.  He  has  also  a  perfect  right,  if  he  desires  to 
establish  one  proposition,  to  prove  another,  as  the  first  step  towards 
it ;  but  he  has  no  right  to  assume  or  imply  that  he  has  made  out 
one  of  his  points,  when  he  has  only  shown  the  probability  of  the 
other. 

Now,  our  author  (p.  19)  declares  that  he  has  one  object ;  viz., 
to  show  the  truth  of  the  doctrine  of  everlasting  punishment.  He 
says,  "  It  will  be  the  aim  of  this  series  of  lectures  to  show  that  the 
doctrine  of  the  eternal  punishment  of  the  ivicked  is  in  entire  har- 
mony loith  the  paternal  character  of  God."  He  then  proceeds  to 
give  the  substance  of  his  argument,  under  eight  heads.  Six  of 
these  only  prove  future  retribution,  and  only  two  of  them  have  any 
direct  bearing  upon  the  main  question.  Yet,  through  all  of  them, 
there  runs  a  quiet  assumption,  that  they  are  bearing  directly  on 
the  main  question.  This  is  the  radical  sophism  of  the  whole 
volume.  We  may  see  this  more  plainly  by  analyzing  some  of  his 
chapters. 

His  first  position  is  this,  in  Lecture  I. :  "  Our  own  nature,  which 
is  appealed  to  as  refusing  to  recognize  the  attribute  of  punitive 
justice  in  a  God  of  love,  in  fact  demands  this  attribute,  as  essen- 
tial to  the  moral  perfection  of  the  Deity  —  an  attribute  without 
which  he  could  not  command  the  confidence  and  homage  of  lils 
intelligent  creatures." 

Before  attempting  to  demonstrate  any  theorem,  it  is  important 
to  define  its  terms.  An  accurate  definition  at  first  of  what  we  wish 
to  prove  would  often  make  a  long  discussion  unnecessary.  What 
is  meant  by  the  "  attribute  of  punitive  justice  "  ?  Does  it  mean 
that  God' s  nature  is  such  that  he  causes  happiness  to  flow  from 
goodness,  and  sufi'ering  from  wickedness,  in  the  constitution  of  the 


APPENDIX.  481 

universe?  If  this  is  meant,  Dr.  Thompson  will  find  no  one  to  op- 
pose him;  for  all  this  can  take  place  in  perfect  accordance  with 
divine  love  to  the  sinner  himself.  What  he  7ieeds  is  suftering: 
this  is  the  way  by  which  he  is  to  be  cured  of  that  sin  which  is  a 
greater  evil  than  suflering.  Or  does  the  author  mean,  by  "  puni- 
tive justice,"  some  attribute  of  the  divine  nature  which  finds  pleas- 
ure in  punishing  the  sinner,  without  regard  to  any  good  which  is 
to  come  from  it,  either  to  him  or  to  any  one  else  ?  Apparently,  this 
last  is  what  he  means;  for  he  goes  on  to  quote  from  Pagan  author- 
ities and  Pagan  religions,  to  show  that  conscience  in  man  requires 
that  the  wicked  should  be  punished,  without  any  regard  to  any 
good  to  result  from  it.  But  these  authorities  only  show,  that,  in 
the  one-sided  action  of  man's  nature,  the  sense  of  justice  acts  in- 
dependently of  love.  What  Dr.  Thompson  has  undertaken  to 
show  is,  that  it  can  act  in  God  in  harmony  with  love.  In  man, 
conscience  produces  hatred  of  sin,  without  regard  to  the  good  of 
the  sinner  ;  but  the  divine  conscience  acts  in  no  such  one-sided  way. 
"  Mercy  and  truth  meet  together ;  righteousness  and  peace  kiss 
each  other."  The  law  is  vindicated  and  the  sinner  benefited  at 
the  same  moment. 

The  atonement  of  Christ,  objectively  considered,  consisted  ex- 
actly in  this,  that  he  showed  a  perfect  reconciliation,  in  his  own 
life,  of  God's  hatred  to  sin,  and  love  to  the  sinner.  No  one  was 
ever  so  averse  from  sin,  no  one  was  ever  so  in  sympathy  with  the 
sinner,  as  Jesus.  The  power  of  his  life,  death,  and  higher  life,  lay 
in  this  union  of  holiness  and  love.  This  Avas  the  objective-atone- 
ment in  Christ,  and  in  this  he  was  God  manifest  in  the  flesh.  He 
who  has  seen  him  has  seen  the  Father.  The  Christianized  con- 
science, following  Christ,  pities  the  sinner,  while  it  abhors  the  sin. 
Christian  legislation  lays  aside  the  vindictive  tendencies  of  natural 
law,  and  seeks  at  the  same  time  to  destroy  evil,  to  protect  society, 
and  to  reform  the  criminal.  From  this  gospel  view  our  author  re- 
mands us  to  Paganism,  and  to  the  dicta  of  the  natural  conscience 
in  unregenerate  man.  These  testimonies  only  show,  that  conscience, 
in  ite  unregenerate  state,  demands  that  the  sinner  be  punished, 
and  loes  not  care  whether  that  punishment  does  him  good  or 
harm,  makes  him  better  or  worse.  But  conscience,  when  Chris- 
tianized, does  care  :  it  wishes  to  save  the  sinner,  while  it  punishes 
the  sin.  As  far  as  the  natural  conscience  goes,  it  speaks  truly  in 
Baying  that  evil  should  follow  sin.  But  why  it  should  follow  it, 
41 


482  OKTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS    AND    ERRORS. 

and  what  shall  be  the  result,  it  does  not  say.  That  was  left  to 
Christ  to  reveal. 

Dr.  Thompson  himself  bears  witness,  unconsciously,  to  the  truth 
of  this  distinction.  Along  with  his  testimonies  from  the  Heathen 
conscience,  he  gives  us  two  testimonies  from  the  Christian  con- 
science. The  one  is  his  own  feehngs  on  seeing  a  woman  carried 
to  the  Tombs.  He  says  he  felt  sympathy  for  her,  and  would  fain 
have  saved  her  from  that  shame,  while  he  wished  her  crime  to  be 
punished.  The  other  is  the  testimony  of  Dr.  Bushnell,  that  the 
"  necessary  reason  "  why  wicked  people,  remaining  wicked,  should 
not  be  in  heaven,  is,  that  it  would  destroy  the  happiness  of  heaven. 
These  two  Christians,  therefore,  have  consciences  which  do  not  tes- 
tify to  punishment  proceeding  from  naked,  arbitrary,  and  vindic- 
tive law,  such  as  the  Pagan  conscience  accepts,  but  punishment 
having  a  reasonable  end,  a  benevolent  purpose,  and  accompanied 
with  sympathy  for  the  sinner. 

Another  position  of  Dr.  Thompson  is,  however,  so  extraordi- 
nary, that  it  needs  more  consideration.  His  fifth  proposition  is 
this :  "  Tlie  high  and  sacred  Fatherhood  lohich  the  gospel  reveals 
is  a  Fatherhood  in  Christ  towards  those  loho  love  7iim,  and  not  a 
general  Fatherhood  of  indiscriminate  love  and  blessing  for  the 
race." 

A  certain  want  of  logical  clearness  in  our  author's  mind  appears 
in  the  very  statement  of  this  proposition.  He  joins  together  a 
positive  and  a  negative,  which  have  no  antithetical  relation.  We 
entirely  agree  with  him,  that  the  Fatherhood  of  God  is  not  one 
of  indiscriminate  love  and  blessing  for  the  race  ;  but  we  utterly 
reject  the  proposition,  that  the  Fatherhood  which  Christ  reveals  is 
only  one  towards  those  who  love  him.  The  apostle  John  tells  us 
that  "  we  love  him  because  he  first  loved  us."  And  again :  "  Here- 
in is  love ;  not  that  we  loved  God,  but  that  he  loved  us,  and  sent 
his  Son  to  be  the  propitiation  for  our  sins."  The  doctrine  of  the 
apostle  is  exactly  opposite  to  that  of  Dr.  Thompson.  The  modern 
divine  teaches  that  God  only  loves  those  who  first  love  him ;  but 
the  ancient  divine  teaches  that  only  by  God's  loving  us  first  do  we 
come  to  love  him.  Nor  is  this  doctrine  pecuUar  to  John.  It  is  a 
fundamental  truth  of  the  New  Testament,  that  God's  fatherly  love, 
manifested  to  the  soul,  creates  an  answering  love,  and  that  nothing 
else  can  create  it.  Jesus  said  of  the  woman,  "  She  loved  much ; 
but  to  whom  little  is  forgiven,  the  same  loveth  little."  God's  for- 
giving love  comes  first,  and  creates  a  grateful  love  in  return.    And 


APPENDIX.  483 

again  we  read  (John  3 :  16),  "  God  so  loved  the  world,  that  he 
gave  his  only-begotten  Son."  He  therefore  loved  the  world  while 
it  was  still  alienated  from  him.  And  again  we  are  told  by  the 
Saviour  (Matt.  5:44)  to  "love  our  enemies,  that  we  may  be  the 
children  of  our  Father  in  heaven,"  who  loves  his  enemies. 

Possibly  our  friend  may  say,  "Yes,  God  loves  the  sinner;  but 
he  does  not  love  him  with  a  fatherhj  love,  but  only  with  a  general 
love."  Perhaps  a  copy  of  the  New  Testament  may  be  used  in  the 
Tabernacle  Church,  New  York,  which  does  not  contain  the  Para- 
ble of  the  Prodigal  Son.  Only  on  some  such  supposition  can  we 
account  for  this  assertion  of  Dr.  Thompson,  that  "  the  high  and 
sacred  Fatherhood  which  the  gospel  reveals  is  a  Fatherhood  in 
Christ. towards  those  who  love  him."  Is  that  "high  and  sacred 
Fatherhood  of  God"  revealed  anywhere  more  fully  and  plainly 
than  in  this  parable?  and  does  it  not  teach  expressly  that  the 
father  loved  the  son,  while  he  was  absent,  as  a  son  ?  Is  not  his 
joy  at  the  return  of  his  son  the  evidence  of  that  love  which  clung 
to  him  while  he  was  away  ?  Even  after  the  son  returned,  he  had 
not  begun  to  love  his  father  as  a  son  :  he  did  not  think  ho  had  any 
right  to  do  so.  He  did  not  expect  that  his  father  would  love  him 
again :  he  only  expected  to  be  as  a  servant.  It  is  evidently,  then, 
utterly  false  to  say  that  God's  Fatherhood,  revealed  in  the  gospel, 
is  only  a  Fatherhood  towards  those  who  love  him :  it  is  a  Father- 
hood to  those  who  hate  him  and  to  those  who  fear  him.  His  love 
creates  theirs,  and  is  not  created  by  it.  Such  a  doctrine  as  this  of 
Dr.  Thompson,  if  generally  believed,  would  sap  the  foundations  of 
Christian  life,  and  turn  the  gospel  of  reconciling  grace  into  a  cold 
system  of  retribution. 

As  a  proof  of  this  melancholy  opinion,  —  an  opinion  which  takes 
the  life  out  of  the  gospel,  —  the  author  relies  chiefly  on  that  pas- 
sage in  which  Jesus  says  to  the  Jews  that  they  were  of  their  father 
the  devil.  (John  8:44.)  From  this  he  argues  that  they  had  no 
right  to  regard  God  as  Father,  and  that  no  one  has  that  right  ex- 
cept pious  believers  in  Christ.  But  was  not  God  at  that  very  mo- 
ment their  Father,  in  the  same  Avay  that  the  father  of  the  prodigal 
S(m  was  his  father  while  he  was  yet  in  the  far  country  ?  The  prod- 
igal son  could  not  see  his  father's  love :  while  absent  from  him,  he 
could  not  tell  how  much  his  father  loved  him.  Only  when  he  re- 
turned, and  came  back  to  his  father's  house,  could  he  behold  that 
blessed  countenance  and  feel  that  pardoning  love.  But  none  the 
less  did  his  father  love  him  during  all  that  absence ;  none  the  less 
did  he  desire  his  return. 


484  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS    AND   ERRORS. 

When  Jesus  said  to  the  unbelieving  Jews,  "  Ye  are  of  your  father 
the  devil,"  was  he  describing  God's  state  of  mind,  or  their  state 
of  mind?  Did  he  mean  that  God  was  alienated  from  them,  or 
that  they  were  alienated  from  God  ?  He  evidently  meant  to  say 
that  they  were  in  a  devilish  state  of  mind ;  that  in  their  character 
and  feelings  they  partook  of  the  spirit  of  the  devil,  and  not  of  the 
spirit  of  God.  He  was  describing  their  position  in  relation  to 
God,  not  God's  position  in  relation  to  them.  The  text,  therefore, 
appears  to  have  no  direct  bearing  on  the  subject.  It  teaches,  in- 
deed, that  they  could  have  no  truly  filial  feeling  towards  God  ;  but 
it  does  not  show  that  he  might  not  have  a  truly  parental  feeling 
towards  them.  If  they  could  not  truly  say,  "  Abba,  Father,"  he 
could  say,  "  My  son,  give  me  thy  heart." 

We  dwell  on  this  because  our  author  seems  to  us  to  have  as- 
sumed a  position  injurious,  if  not  fatal,  to  the  most  vital  force  of 
the  gospel.  That  which  subdues  and  converts  the  heart,  and  makes 
all  things  new  in  the  soul,  is  not  to  be  told,  that  God  will  be  our 
Father  when  we  love  him,  but  that  he  is  our  Fathev  now.  "  Here- 
in is  love  ;  not  that  we  loved  God,  but  that  he  loved  us."  "  God 
commends  his  love  toward  us,  that,  while  toe  were  sinners,  Christ 
died  for  us."  But  why  multiply  quotations  to  prove  that  which  is 
written  on  the  face  of  the  gospel,  and  to  which  all  Christian  ex- 
perience bears  testimony  ?  It  is  God's  love  to  us,  descending  in 
Christ,  while  we  are  estranged  and  far  off,  which  draws  up  our 
affection  to  him  :  it  is  not  our  love  which  takes  the  initiative,  and 
draws  his  down. 

The  sixth  position  argues  future  retribution  from  the  demerit  of 
sin,  and  asserts  that  "  no  punishment  equal  to  the  demerit  of  sin 
is,  or  can  be,  inflicted  in  the  present  life." 

The  boldness  of  this  proposition  is  only  equalled  by  the  poverty 
of  the  reasoning  by  which  it  is  supported.  To  assert  that  it  is  not 
in  the  power  of  God  adequately  to  punish  sin  in  this  world,  is  to 
profess  a  knowledge  of  the  resources  of  Omnipotence,  and  an  ac- 
quaintance with  the  deserts  of  man,  which  it  seems  to  us  presump- 
tuous to  claim.  On  this  point  it  is  not  necessary  to  enlarge.  An 
a  priori  argument  to  prove  that  God  cannot  punish  sin  in  this  life 
as  much  as  it  deserves  to  be  punished,  can  carry  conviction  to  no 
mind  which  possesses  any  intellectual  humility. 

The  seventh  position  declares  that  "  there  is  no  conceivable  mode 
md  no  revealed  promise  by  which  the  Fatherhood  of  God  can 
make  one,  dying  in  impenitence  and  unbelief,  holy  and  blessed  in 
jhe  future  world." 


APPENDIX.  485 

This  is,  of  course,  the  very  key-slone  of  the  argument  in  supjjurt 
of  the  doctrine  of  everlasting  punishment.  The  burden  of  proof 
rests  upon  those  who  assert  that  doctrine.  It  is  not  enough  that 
Scripture  does  not  expressly  declare  that  there  is  an  opportunity 
in  the  other  life  for  repentance  and  pardon ;  for  Scripture  is  deal- 
ing with  us  in  this  life,  and  has  no  occasion  to  say  much  of  the 
opportunities  of  the  other.  Those  who  wish  to  prove  that  there 
is  no  opportunity  hereafter  must  show  some  text  which  expressly 
declares  it.  No  such  text  is  produced,  and  there  is  no  such  text 
in  the  Bible.  If  Jesus  had  said,  "  You  must  repent  in  this  life,  for 
after  death  there  will  be  no  opportunity ;  "  or,  "  At  death,  man's 
spiritual  condition  is  finally  determined  ;  "  or,  "  After  this  life,  man 
cannot  turn  from  evil  to  good,"  —  we  should  have  some  distinct 
proof  of  the  doctrine.     But  now  we  have  none. 

The  Parable  of  Dives  and  Lazarus  is  referred  to  more  than  once 
by  our  author  in  support  of  his  position.  It  is  sufficient  to  say  in 
regard  to  this,  that  the  most  Orthodox  commentators,  provided 
they  are  scholars,  expressly  deny  that  this  refers  to  the  doctrine  of 
everlasting  punishment.  Olshausen,  for  instance,  says,  "  Rightly 
to  understand  the  whole  delineation,  we  must,  above  all,  keep  clear- 
ly in  view,  that  it  is  not  everlasting  salvation  or  condemnation 
which  is  here  described,  but  the  middle  state  of  de])arted  souls, 
between  death  and  the  resurrection."  "  In  our  parable,  thei'e  is 
no  possible  reference  to  the  everlasting  condemnation  of  the  rich 
man,  inasmuch  as  the  germ  of  love,  and  of  faith  in  love,  is  clearly 
expressed  in  his  words."  The  word  translated  "  hell "  in  this  par- 
able is  not  Gehenna,  but  Hades. 

Our  author  says,  and  says  justly,  that  we  can  form  no  opinion 
as  to  another  probation  hereafter  from  a  jniori  reasoning,  but  that 
the  question  must  be  answered  only  from  Scripture.  Having  said 
this,  he  immediately  proceeds  to  argue  it,  a  priori,  stating  that  there 
are  only  three  conceivable  modes  by  which  those  dying  impenitent 
can  be  saved ;  and  then  tries  to  show  that  neither  is  possible. 
After  tliis,  he  quotes  a  few  passages  bearing  only  indirectly,  and  by 
inference,  upon  the  question.  The  Parable  of  the  Ten  Virgins  is 
one  of  these,  because  in  it  it  is  said,  "  The  door  is  shut ;  "  and, 
"  Depart !  I  know  you  not."  With  regard  to  this  parable,  also, 
Olshausen  says  that  "  the  words  '  I  know  you  not '  cannot  denote 
eternal  condemnation  ; "  that  the  foolish  virgins  were  "  saved,  but 
not  sanctified;  "  and  that  the  parable  does  not  distinguish  between 
41* 


486  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

the  penitent  and  the  impenitent,  but  between'  the  penitent  believ- 
ers who  watch  and  those  who  do  not  watch. 

Of  course,  we  have  not  been  able  to  notice  all  the  arguments  of 
this  book,  or  all  the  texts  referred  to  ;  but  we  have  perhaps  said 
enough  to  show  that  its  positions  are  not  all  tenable,  and  that  its 
arguments  are  not  absolutely  unanswerable.  This  book  of  Dr. 
Thompson,  though  able,  cannot  be  called  conclusive. 

§  5.  Defence  of  the  Trinity,  hy  Frederick  D.  Huntington,  D.  D. 
The  last  section  of  this  Appendix  shall  be  devoted  to  an  examina- 
tion and  criticism  of  Dr.  Huntington's  sermon,  printed  some  time 
since,  in  defence  of  the  Trinity.  The  course  of  our  argument  will 
be  as  follows.  We  shall  give  the  reasons  which  have  induced 
Unitarians  to  reject  the  Church  doctrine  of  the  Trinity ;  also  ex- 
amining Dr.  Huntington's  positions  and  arguments  in  its  support. 

The  principal  reasons,  then,  for  rejecting  the  Church  doctrine 
of  the  Trinity,  as  assigned  by  Unitarians,  are  these  :  — 

1.  That  it  is  nowhere  taught  in  the  New  Testament. 

2.  That  every  statement  of  the  Trinity,  which  has  ever  been 
made,  has  been  either,  (1.)  Self-contradictory;  (2.)  Unintelligible; 
(3.)  Tritheistic ;  or,  (4.)  Unitarian,  in  the  form  of  Sabellianism,  or 
of  Arianism. 

3.  That  the  arguments  for  it  are  inadequate. 

4.  That  the  arguments  against  it  are  overwhelming. 

5.  That  the  good  ascribed  to  it  does  not  belong  to  it,  but  to  the 
truths  which  underlie  it. 

6.  That  great  evils  to  the  Church  come  from  it. 

7.  That  it  is  a  doctrine  of  philosophy,  and  not  of  faith. 

8.  That  we  can  trace  its  gradual  historic  formation  in  the  Chris- 
tian Church. 

9.  That  it  is  opposed  to  a  belief  in  the  real  divinity  of  Christ, 
and  to  a  belief  in  his  real  humanity  ;  thus  undermining  continually 
the  faith  of  the  Church  in  the  divine  humanity  of  Christ  Jesus  the 
Lord. 

Proceeding,  then,  to  an  examination  of  these  reasons,  we  say,  — 
I.    The  Church  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  is  nowhere  stated  in  the 
New  Testament. 

To  prove  this,  as  it  is  a  negative  proposition,  would  require  us  to 
go  through  the  whole  New  Testament.  But  we  are  saved  this 
necessity  by  the  fact  that  we  have  a  statement  on  this  point  from 
one  of  Dr.  Huntington's  own  witnesses,  and  one  on  whom   he 


APPENDIX.  487 

mainly  relies.  He  brings  forward  Neander,  the  great  Church  his- 
torian, as  a  believer  in  the  Trinity  (p.  361),  and  again  (p.  378), 
by  an  error  which  he  has  since  candidly  admitted,  quotes 
him  as  saying,  "  It  is  the  fundamental  article  of  the  Christian 
faith,"  —  which  is  just  what  he  denies  in  the  following  passage. 
AVe  call  Neander  to  the  stand,  however,  noiv,  to  have  his  unim- 
peacliable  testimony  as  a  Trinitarian  (and  a  Trinitarian  claimed  by 
br.  Huntington  with  pride)  to  the  fact,  that  the  doctrine  of  the 
Trinity  is  nowhere  stated  in  the  New  Testament.  This  is  what 
Neander  says  of  the  Trinity,  in  the  first  volume  of  his  great  work 
on  Church  History  (p.  572,  Torrey's  translation) :  — 

"  We  now  proceed  to  the  doctrine  in  which  Theism,  taken  in  its 
connection  with  the  proper  and  fundamental  essence  of  Christianity, 
or  with  the  doctrine  of  redemption,  finds  its  ultimate  completion  — 
the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity.  This  doctrine  does  not  strictly  belong 
to  the  fundamental  articles  of  the  Christian  faith,  as  appears  suffi- 
ciently evident  from  the  fact,  that  it  is  expressly  held  forth  in  no 
one  particular  imssage  of  the  New  Testament ;  for  the  only  one  in 
which  it  is  done,  the  passage  relating  to  the  three  that  bear  record 
(1  John  5  :  7),  is  undoubtedly  si)urious,  and  in  its  ungenuine  shape, 
testifies  to  the  fact,  how  foreign  such  a  collocation  is  from  the  style 
of  the  New  Testament  Scriptures.  We  find  in  the  New  Testament 
no  other  fundamental  article  than  that  of  which  the  apostle  Paul 
Bays,  that  other  foundation  can  no  man  lay  than  that  is  laid  —  the 
annunciation  of  Jesus  as  the  Messiah." 

With  this  authority  we  might  be  content.  But  Dr.  Huntington 
difiers  from  Neander  in  thinking  that  Jesus  has  himself  stated  the 
doctrine  of  the  Trinity,  and  stated  it  clearly  and  fully,  in  the  bap- 
tismal formula.  (Matt.  28  :  19.)  He  says  that  this  is  "  a  clear 
and  full  declaration  of  the  fundamental  article  of  Christian  belief." 
He  says,  "  Now,  if  ever,  Christ  will  distinctly  proclaim  the  doctrine 
of  Christendom ; "  and  he  then  declares  that  Christ,  in  this  pas- 
sage, told  his  Church  to  baptize  "  in  the  Triune  name."  * 

Not  in  the  Ti-'mne  name,  certainly.  This  is  an  assumption  of  our 
fiiend.  He  may  think  that  this  is  implied  ;  that  this  is  to  be  in- 
ferred ;  that  this  is  what  Christ  meant ;  but  certainly  it  is  not  what 
Christ  said.  Christ  gives  us  here  three  objects  of  baptism,  no 
doubt ;  but  he  does  not  say  that  they  are  one.  How  far  this  bap- 
tismal  formula  is  "  a  clear  and  full  declaration  "  of  the  doctrine 

*  "  Abi  ad  Jordanum,  et  Trinitatem  disce,"  was  an  early  notion. 


488     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

of  the   Trinity  will  appear   thus.     The  doctrine  of  the   Trinity 
declares,  — 

1.  That  the  Father  is  God. 

2.  That  the  Son  is  God. 

3.  That  the  Holy  Ghost  is  God. 

4.  That  the  Holy  Ghost  is  a  person,  like  the  Father  and 
the  Son. 

5.  That  these  three  persons  constitute  one  God. 

Of  these  five  propositions,  all  of  which  are  essential  to  the  dot- 
trine  of  the  Trinity,  not  one  is  stated  in  the  baptismal  formula. 
Christ  here  says  nothing  about  the  deity  of  the  Father,  the  Son,  or 
the  Holy  Ghost ;  nothing  about  the  personality  of  either  of  them  ; 
and  nothing  about  their  unity.  It  is  difficult  to  conceive,  there- 
fore, how  Dr.  Huntington  can,  bring  himself  to  call  this  a  com- 
mand to  baptize  in  the  Triune  name. 

Dr.  Huntington  adds,  "  Our  faith  is  summoned  to  the  three  per- 
sons of  the  one  God."  But  nothing  is  said  of  three  persons; 
nothing  is  said  of  their  being  one  God. 

He  says,  "  No  hint  is  given  that  there  is  any  difference  of  nature, 
dignity,  duration,  power,  or  glory,  between  them." 

We  admit  it,  but  also  say,  that  no  hint  is  given  of  any  equality  of 
nature,  dignity,  duration,  power,  or  glory,  between  them.  Which 
way,  then,  is  the  argument  ?  Christ  does  not  state,  on  the  one  hand, 
that  the  three  are  unequal  or  different :  he  does  not  state,  on  the 
other  hand,  that  they  are  equal  and  the  same.  The  inference  of 
proof  from  this  fact  seems  to  us  to  be  this :  If  the  apostles,  when 
Christ  spoke  to  them,  were  already  full  believers  in  the  church 
doctrine  of  the  Trinity,  the  fact  that  Christ  did  not  deny  it  would 
be  an  argument  in  its  favor  ;  but  if  the  apostles  were,  at  that  time, 
wholly  ignorant  of  the  Trinity,  then  the  fact,  that  he  did  not  assert 
it  distinctly,  at  least  shows  that  he  did  not  mean  to  teach  it  at  that 
time.  That  infei-ence  appears  to  us  a  very  modest  one.  But  Dr. 
Huntington  will  admit  that  they  did  not  know  the  doctrine ;  for 
he  tells  us  that  it  was  the  purpose  of  Clnist  to  teach  it  to  them  at 
that  time.  To  which  we  can  only  reply.  If  he  meant  to  teach  the 
doctrine,  why  did  he  not  teach  it  ? 

That  the  word  Trinity  is  not  to  be  found  in  the  New  Testament, 
and  that  it  was  invented  by  TertuUian,  is  a  matter  of  little  conse- 
quence ;  but  that  the  doctrine  itself  should  be  nowhere  stated  in 
the  New  Testament  we  conceive  to  be  a  matter  of  very  great  con- 
sequence.    We  have  seen  that  Dr.  Huntington's  attempt  to  show 


APPENDIX.  489 

that  it  is  stated  in  the  baptismal  formula  is  a  failure.  If  not  stated 
there,  we  presume  that  he  will  not  maintain  that  it  is  stated  any- 
where. We  therefore  agree  with  Neander  in  saying,  that,  whether 
the  doctrine  be  true  or  not,  it  is  not  taught  distinctly  in  the  Now 
Testament.  If  taught  at  all,  it  is  only  taught  inferentially  ;  that 
is,  it  is  a  matter  of  reasoning,  not  a  matter  of  faith.  It  is  meta- 
physics :  it  is  not  religion. 

II.  The  second  reason  why  Unitarians  reject  the  Church  doctrine 
of  the  Trinity  is  this  :  — 

That  every  statement  of  the  Trinity  has  proved,  on  examination, 
to  be  either,  (1.)  A  contradiction  in  terms;  or,  (2.)  Unintelligible  ; 
or,  (3.)  Tritheistic  ;  or,  (4.)  Unitarianism  under  a  Trinitarian  form. 

Let  us  examine  this  objection.  What  is  the  general  statement 
of  the  Trinity,  as  made  by  the  Orthodox  Church,  Catholic  and 
Protestant  ?     Fortunately,  this  question  is  easily  answered. 

Orthodoxy  has  been  consistent  since  the  middle  ages  in  its  gen- 
eral statement,  however  much  it  may  have  varied  in  its  explana- 
tions of  what  it  meant  by  that  statement. 

The  doctrine  of  the  Trinity,  as  it  stands  in  the  creeds  of  the 
churches,  is  this  :  — 

There  is  in  the  nature  of  God  three  persons,  —  the  Father,  the 
Son,  and  the  Holy  Ghost,  —  and  these  three  are  one  being.  They 
are  the  same  in  substance,  equal  in  power  and  glory.  Each  of 
these  three  persons  is  very  God,  infinite  in  all  attributes  ;  and  yet 
there  are  not  three  Gods,  but  one  God. 

According  to  the  general  doctrine  of  Orthodoxy,  the  unity  of 
God  is  in  being,  essence,  and  substance  ;  that  is,  God  is  one  being, 
God  i«  one  essence,  God  is  one  substance.  The  threefold  division 
stops  short  of  the  being  of  God  :  it  does  not  penetrate  to  his 
essential  nature  :  it  does  not  divide  his  substance. 

What,  then,  is  the  Trinity  ?     It  is  a  Trinity  of  persons. 

But  what  is  meant  by  "  person,"  as  used  in  this  doctrine  ?  Ac- 
cording to  the  common  and  familiar  use  of  the  word  at  the  present 
time,  three  persons  are  three  beings.  Personality  expresses  the 
most  individual  existence  imaginable.  If,  therefore,  the  word 
"  person "  is  to  be  taken  according  to  the  common  use  of  the 
phrase,  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  would  be  evidently  a  contra- 
diction in  terms.  It  would  be  equivalent  to  saying,  God  is  one 
being,  but  God  is  three  beings ;  which  again  would  be  equivalent 
to  saying  that  one  is  three. 


490  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS   AND    MIRRORS. 

Now,  Trinitarians  generally  are  too  acute  and  clear-sighted  to 
fall  into  such  a  palpable  conti'adiction  as  this.  It  is  a  common  ac- 
cusation against  them,  that  they  believe  one  to.be  three,  and  three 
one ;  but  this  charge  is,  in  most  cases,  unjust.  This  would  be 
only  true  in  case  they  affirmed  that  God  is  three  in  the  same  way 
in  which  he  is  one  ;  but  they  do  not  usually  say  this.  They 
declare  that  he  is  one  being,  —  not  three  beings.  They  declare 
that  the  threefold  distinction  relates  to  ^personality,  not  to  being, 
and  that  they  use  the  word  "  person,"  not  in  the  common  sense, 
but  in  a  peculiar  sense,  to  express,  as  well  as  they  can,  a  distinc- 
tion, which,  from  the  poverty  of  language,  no  word  can  be  found 
to  express  exactly.  Thus  St.  Augustine  confessed,  long  ago,  "  We 
say  that  there  are  three  persons,  not  in  order  to  say  anything,  but 
in  order  not  to  be  wholly  silent."  Non  ut  aliquid  diceretur,  sed 
ut  ne  taceretur.  And  so  Archbishop  Whately,  in  the  notes  to  his 
Logic,  regrets  that  the  word  "  person "  should  ever  have  been 
used  by  our  divines  ;  and  says,  "  If  hypostasis,  or  any  other  com- 
pletely foreign  word,  had  been  used  instead,  no  idea  at  all  would 
have  been  conveyed,  except  that  of  the  explanation  given ;  and 
thus  the  danger,  at  least,  of  being  misled  by  a  word,  would  ha-v  ^ 
been  avoided." 

(1.)    The  Unintelligible  Statement. 

The  Trinitarian  thus  avoids  asking  us  to  believe  a  contradic- 
tion ;  but,  in  avoiding  this,  he  runs  upon  another  rock  —  that, 
namely,  of  not  asking  us  to  believe  anything  at  all ;  for  if  "  person  " 
here  does  not  mean  what  it  commonly  means,  and  if  it  be  impos- 
sible, from  the  poverty  of  language,  to  define  precisely  the  idea 
which  is  intended  by  it,  we  are  then  asked  to  believe  a  proppsition 
which  Trinitarians  themselves  are  unable  to  express.  But  a  propo- 
sition which  is  not  expressed  is  no  proposition.  A  proposition,  any 
important  term  of  which  is  unintelligible,  is  wholly  unintelligible. 

To  make  this  matter  clear,  let  us  put  it  into  a  conversational 
form.  We  will  suppose  that  two  persons  meet  together,  —  one  a 
Unitarian,  the  other  a  Trinitarian. 

Trinitarian.  You  do  not  believe  the  Trinity  ?  Then  you  can- 
not be  saved.  No  one  can  be  saved  who  denies  the  Trinity.  It  is 
a  vital  and  fundamental  doctrine. 

Unitarian.  Tell  me  what  it  is,  and  I  will  see  if  I  can  believe  it. 
What  is  the  Trinity  ? 

Trin.     God  exists  as  one  being,  but  three  persons. 


APPENDIX.  401 

Unit.  What  do  you  mean  by  "  person  "  ?  Do  you  mean  a  per- 
son like  Peter,  James,  or  John  ? 

Trill.  No ;  we  use  "  person  "  from  the  poverty  of  language. 
We  do  not  mean  that. 

Unit.     What,  then,  do  you  mean  by  it? 

Trin.     It  is  a  mystery.     We  cannot  understand  it  precisely. 

Unit.  I  have  no  objection  to  the  doctrine  being  mysterious  ;  I 
believe  a  great  many  tliiugs  which  are  mysterious ;  but  I  don't 
want  the  lannuage  to  be  mysterious.  You  might  as  well  use  a 
Greek,  or  a  Hebrew,  or  a  Chinese  word,  and  ask  me  to  believe  that 
there  are  three  hijpostases  or  xXwee prosopa  in  Deity,  if  you  do  not 
tell  me  what  you  mean  by  the  word  "  person." 

Trin.  It  is  a  great  mystery.  It  is  a  matter  o?  faith,  not  of 
reasoning.     You  must  believe  it,  and  not  speculate  about  it. 

Unit.  Believe  it  9  Believe  what  ?  I  am  waiting  for  you  to  tell 
me  what  I  am  to  believe.  I  am  ready  to  exercise  my  faith ;  but 
you  are  tasking,  not  my  faith,  but  my  knowledge  of  language.  I 
suppose  that  you  do  not  wish  me  to  believe  zvords,  but  thoughts. 
I  wish  to  look  through  the  word,  and  see  what  thought  lies 
behind  it. 

Xow^,  it  seems  to  us  that  this  is  a  very  fair  demand  of  the  Uni- 
tarian. To  ask  us  to  believe  a  proposition,  any  important  term  of 
which  is  unintelligible,  is  precisely  equivalent  to  asking  us  to 
believe  no  proposition  at  all.  Let  us  listen  to  Paul :  "  Even  things 
without  life,  giving  sound,  whether  pipe  or  harp,  except  they  give 
a  distinction  in  the  sounds,  how  shall  it  be  known  what  is  piped  or 
harped  ?  For,  if  the  trumpet  give  an  uncertain  sound,  who  shall 
prepare  himself  for  battle  ?  So  likewise  ye,  except  ye  utter  by  the 
tongue  words  easy  to  be  understood,  how  shall  it  be  known  what 
is  spoken?  for  ye  shall  speak  into  the  air.  .  .  .  For,  if  I  know  not 
the  meaning  of  the  voice,  I  shall  be  unto  him  that  spealieth  a  bar- 
barian ;  and  he  that  spcaketh,  a  barbarian  unto  me." 

It  is  of  no  use  to  talk  about  mystery  in  order  to  excuse  cur- 
selves  for  not  using  intelligible  language.  That  which  is  myste- 
rious is  one  thing  ;  that  which  is  unintelligible  is  quite  another 
thing.  We  may  understand  what  a  mystery  is,  though  we  cannot 
comprehend  how  it  is  ;  but  that  which  is  unintelligible  we  neither 
comprehend  nor  understand  at  all.  We  neither  know  hoio  it  is,  nor 
what  it  is.  Thus,  for  example,  the  fact  of  God's  foreknowledge 
and  man's  fi'eedom  is  a  mystery.  I  cannot  comprehend  how  God 
can  foreknow  what  I  am  to  do  to-morrow,  and  yet  I  be  liee  to  do 


492     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

it  or  not  to  do  it.  I  cannot  compi'ehend  how  Jesus  should  be  de- 
livered to  death  by  the  determined  counsel  and  foreknowledge  of 
God,  and  yet  the  Jews  have  been  free  agents  in  crucifying  him 
and  accountable  for  it.  These  things  are  mysteries ;  but  they  are 
not  unintelligible  as  doctrines.  I  see  what  is  meant  by  them. 
There  is  no  obscurity  in  the  assertion  that  God  foreknows  every- 
thing, nor  in  the  other  assertion  that  man  is  a  free  agent.  I  can  see 
clearly  what  is  implied  in  both  statements,  although  my  mind  can- 
not grasp  both,  and  bring  them  together,  and  show  the  way  in 
which  they  may  be  reconciled.  So,  too,  infinity  is  a  mystery.  We 
cannot  comprehend  it.  Our  mind  cannot  go  round  it,  grasp  it, 
sustain  it.  Our  thought  sinks  baffled  before  the  attempt  to  pene- 
trate to  the  depth  of  such  a  wonderful  idea.  But  we  understand 
■well  enough  what  is  meant  by  infinity.  There  is  nothing  obscure 
in  the  statement  of  the  fact,  that  the  universe  is  unbounded.  So 
the  way  in  which  a  flower  gitjws  from  its  seed  is  mysterious-.  We 
cannot  comprehend  how  the  wonderful  principle  of  life  can  be 
wrapped  up  in  those  little  folds,  and  how  it  can  cause  the  root  to 
strilie  downward,  and  the  airy  stalk  to  spring  lightly  upward,  and 
the  leaves  to  unfold,  and,  last  of  all,  the  bright,  consummate  flower 
to  open  its  many-colored  eye.  But  certainly  we  can  understand 
very  well  the  statement  that  a  flower  grows,  though  we  do  not  com- 
prehend how  it  grows. 

Do  not,  then,  tell  us,  when  you  have  announced  a  doctrine,  the 
language  of  which  is  unintelligible,  that  you  have  told  us  a  mys- 
tery. You  have  done  no  such  thing.  Your  proposition  ia  not 
mysterious :  it  is  unintelligible.  It  is  not  a  mystery :  it  is  only  a 
mystification. 

(2.)    The  Tntheistic  Statement. 

Leaving,  then,  this  ground  of  mystery,  and  attempting  to  define 
more  clearly  what  he  means  by  three  persons  and  one  substance, 
the  Trinitarian  often  sinks  the  Unity  in  the  Triplicity,  and  so  runs 
ashore  upon  Tritheism.  This  happens  when  he  explains  the  term 
"  person "  as  implying  independent  existence ;  in  wliich  case  the 
Unity  is  changed  into  Union.  Then  we  have  really  three  Gods : 
the  Father,  who  devises  the  plan  of  redemption ;  the  Son,  who 
goes  forth  to  execute  it ;  and  the  Holt  Spirit,  who  sanctifies  be- 
lievers. If  there  are  these  three  distinct  beings,  they  can  be  called 
one  God  only  as  they  are  one  in  will,  in  aim,  in  purpose,  —  only  as 
they  agree  perfectly  on  all  points.     The  Unity  of  God,  then,  be- 


APPENDIX.  493 

comes  only  a  unity  of  agreement,  not  a  unity  of  being.  Tliis  is 
evidently  not  the  Unity  which  is  taught  in  the  Bible,  where  Jesus 
declaresthat  the  Jirst  of  all  the  commandments  is,  "  Hear,  O  Israel ! 
the  Lord  our  God  is  ONK  Lord." 

Moreover,  against  such  a  Trinity  as  this  there  are  insuperable 
objections,  from  grounds  of  reason  as  well  as  of  Scripture. 
For  God  is  the  Supreme  Being,  the  Most  High;  and  how  can 
there  be  three  Supreme  Beings,  three  Most  High  Gods?  Again: 
God  is  the  First  Cause ;  but  if  the  Father,  the  Son,  and  the  Holy 
Ghost  are  each  God,  and  all  equal  in  power  and  majesty,  and  have 
each  an  independent  existence,  then  there  are  three  first  causes  ; 
which  is  evidently  impossible.  Again :  one  of  the  attributes  of 
God  is  his  independent  or  absolute  existence.  A  being  who  de- 
pends on  another  cannot  be  the  Supreme  God.  The  Father,  Son, 
and  Spirit,  therefore,  cannot  depend  on  each  other ;  for  each,  by 
depending  on  another,  would  cease  to  be  the  independent  God. 
But,  if  they  do  not  depend  on  each  other,  then  each  ceases  to  be 
God,  who  is  the  First  Cause ;  for  that  being  is  not  the  First  Cause 
who  has  two  other  beings  independent  of  him.  Other  arguments 
of  the  same  kind  might  be  adduced  to  show  that  there  cannot  be 
three  necessary  beings.  In  fact,  all  the  arguments  from  reason, 
which  go  to  prove  the  Unity  of  God,  prove  a  unity  of  nature,  not 
of  agreement. 

"  But  why  argue  against  Tritheism  ?  "  you  may  say.  "  Are  any 
Tritheists  ?  "  Yes :  many  Trinitarians  are  in  reality  Tritheists,  by 
their  own  account  of  themselves.  There  are  many  who  make  the 
Unity  of  God  a  mere  unity  of  agreement,  and  talk  about  the  so- 
cietij  in  the  Godhead,  and  the  intercourse  between  the  Father,  Son, 
and  Spirit.* 

*  Dr.  Horace  BushncU,  afavorite  authority  with  Dr.  Huntington,  whom  Dr. 
Huntington  quotes  largely,  and  whose  views  he  earnestly  recommends,  gives 
us  his  testimony  to  this  point,  thus  ("  God  in  Christ,"  pp.  130,  131) :  — 

"  A  very  large  portion  of  Christian  teachers,  together  with  the  general  mas8 
of  disciples,  undoubtedly  hold  three  real  living  persons  in  the  interior  nature 
of  God-  that  is,  three  consciousnesses,  wills,  hearts,  understandings." 

"  A  very  large  portion  of  Christian  teachers  "  hold,  then,  to  a  belief  ni  three 
Gods ;  and  with  them  is  joined  "  the  general  mass  of  the  disciples."  Tlie  only 
Unity  held  by  these  teachers  is,  he  goes  on  to  say,  "  a  social  Unity.-'  Father, 
Son  and  Holy  Ghost  are,  in  their  view,  socially  united  only,  and  preside  m 
that  way,  as  a  kind  of  celestial  Tritheocracy,  over  the  world.  This  heresy, 
lie  savs  '•  because  of  its  clear  opposition  to  Unitarianism,  is  counted  safe,  and 
never"  treated  as  a  heresy."  That  is,  the  Christian  Church  allows  the  belief 
in  three  Gods,  and  will  not  discipline  those  who  hold  that  opinion  ;  but,  if  you 
believe  strictly  and  only  in  one  God,  you  cannot  be  saved : 

■42 


494     ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

Opposed  to  this  kind  of  Trinity  is  another  view,  in  which  the 
Unity  is  preserved,  but  the  Trinity  lost.  According  to  this  view, 
God  is  one  Being,  who  reveals  himself  in  three  ways,  — as  Father, 
as  Son,  as  Spirit,  —  or  sustains  three  relations,  or  manifests  him- 
self in  three  modes  of  operation.  The  Trinity  here  becomes  a 
nominal  thing,  and  is,  in  reality,  only  Unitarianism  with  an  Ortho- 
dox name.  This  kind  of  Trinity  also  is  very  prevalent,  and  is  the  one 
really  maintained  by  men  of  high  standing  in  the  Orthodox  Church, 
both  in  Europe  and  America.  According  to  this  view,  the  word 
"  person  "  in  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  means  the  same  as  the  cor- 
responding word  in  Greek  and  Latin  formerly  meant ;  namely,  the 
outward  character,  not  the  inward  individuality.  Thus  Cicero 
says,  "  I,  being  one,  sustain  three  persons  or  characters ;  my  own, 
that  of  my  client,  and  that  of  the  judge"  —  Ego  unus,  sustineo 
tres  personas. 

This  view  of  the  Trinity  is  commonly  called  Modalism,  or  Sa- 
bellianism,  and  is  also  widely  held  by  those  who  call  themselves 
Trinitarians.  It  is,  in  fact,  only  Unitarianism  under  a  Triiritariaa 
name.* 

(3.)    The  Subordination  Vieio. 

Avoiding  these  two  extremes,  and  j-et  wishing  to  retain  a 
distinct  idea  of  Unity  and  Tri-personality,  the  Trinitarian  is  neces- 
sarily driven  upon  a  third  view,  in  which  the  Father  is  the  only 
really  Supreme  and  Independent  Being,  the  Son  and  the  Holy 
Spirit  subordinate  and  dependent. 

This  view,  which  is  called  tlie  subordination  scheme,  or  Arian- 
ism,  is  Unitarianism  again  in  another  form ;  and  this  view  also  is 
entertained  by  many  who  still  retain  the  name  of  "Trinitarians." 
According  to  this  view,  the  Son  and  the  Holy  Ghost  are  really 
God,  but  are  so  by  a  derived  divinit)'.     God  the  Father  communi- 

*  Dr.  Bushnell  goes  on  to  say  (p.  1.33),  "  While  the  Unity  is  thus  confused 
and  lost  in  the  threeness,  perhaps  I  should  admit  that  the  threeness  some- 
times appears  to  be  clouded  or  obscured  by  the  Unity.  Thus  it  is  sometimes 
protested,  that  in  the  word,  '  person '  nothing-  is  meant  beyond  a  threefold 
distinction;  though  it  will  always  be  observed,  that  nothing  ia  really  meant 
by  the  protestation;  that  the  protester  goes  on  to  speak  and  to  reason  of  the 
three,  not  as  being  only  somewhats  or  distinctions,  but  as  metaphysical  and 
real  persons.  .  .  .  Indeed,  it  is  a  somewhat  curious  fact  in  theology,  that  the 
class  of  teachers  who  protest  over  the  word  '  person,'  declaring  that  they 
mean  only  a  threefold  distinction,  cannot  show  that  there  is  really  a  hair'a 
breadth  of  difference  between  their  doctrine  and  the  doctrine  asserted  by  many 
of  the  lator  Unitarians." 


APPENDIX.  495 

cates  his  divinity  to  the  Son  and  the  Holy  Ghost.  This  is  the 
view  really  taken  in  the  Nicene  Creed,  though  adopted  in  opposi- 
tion to  the  Arians,  and  was  the  doctrine  of  the  earliest  Church 
Fathers  before  the  Arian  controversy  began.  In  the  Nicene 
Creed,  we  read  that  the  Son  is  "  God  of  {ix)  God,  Light  of  (tx) 
Light,  true  God  of  true  God ;  "  the  "  of"  here  being  the  same  as 
"  from,"  and  denoting  origin  and  derivation. 

This  doctrine  seems,  in  reality,  to  have  less  in  its  favor  than 
either  of  the  others.  By  calling  the  Son  and  Holy  Spirit  God,  it 
contrives  to  make  three  distinct  Gods,  and  so  is  Tritheism ;  and 
yet,  by  making  them  dependent  on  the  Father,  it  becomes  Unita- 
rianism  again.  Thus,  singularly  enough,  this  attempt  at  making  a 
compromise  between  Unity  and  Trinity  loses  both  Unity  and  Trin- 
ity ;  for  it  makes  three  Gods,  aud  so  loses  the  Unity;  and  yet  it 
makes  Christ  not  "  God  over  all,"  not  the  Supreme  Being,  and  so 
loses  the  Trinity. 

Between  these  different  views,  between  Tritheism,  Sabellianism, 
and  Arianism,  the  Orthodox  Trinity  has  always  swung  to  and  fro, 
—  inclining  more  to  one  or  to  the  other  according  to  the  state  of 
controversy  in  any  particular  age.  When  the  Arian  or  Tritheistic 
views  were  proclaimed  and  defended,  the  Orthodoxy  of  the  Church 
swung  over  towards  Sabellianism,  making  the  Unity  strong  and 
solid ;  and  the  Trinity  became  a  thin  mode  or  an  airy  abstraction. 
When  Sabellianism,  thus  encouraged,  came  openlv  forward,  and 
defended  its  system  and  won  adherents,  then  Church  Orthodoxy 
would  hasten  to  set  up  barriers  on  that  side,  and  would  fatl  back 
upon  Tritheistic  ground,  making  the  Thi'eefold  Personality  a  pro- 
found and  real  distinction,  penetrating  the  very  nature  of  Deity, 
and  changing  the  Unity  of  Being  into  a  mere  Unity  of  Will  or 
agreement.  We  will  venture  to  say,  that  there  has  never  yet  been 
a  definition  of  the  Trinity  which  has  not  been  either  Tritheistic  or 
Modalistic ;  and  Church  Orthodoxy  has  always  stood  either  on 
Tritheistic  or  on  Sabellian  ground.  In  other  words,  the  Orthodox 
Trinity  of  any  age,  wdien  searched  to  the  bottom,  has  proved  to  be 
Unitarianism,  after  all  —  Unitarianism  in  the  Tritheistic  or  in  the 
Sabellian  disguise  ;  for  the  Tritheism  of  three  coequal,  indepen- 
dent, and  absolute  Gods,  is  too  much  opposed  both  to  reason  and 
Scripture  to  be  able  ever  to  maintain  itself  openly  as  a  theology  for 
any  length  of  time. 

The  analogies  which  are  used  to  explain  the  Trinity  are  all  either 
Sabellian  or  Tritheistic.     Nature  has  been  searched  in  all  ages  for 


496  ORTHODOXY  :    ITS   TRUTHS   AND   ERRORS. 

these  analogies,  by  Avhich  to  make  the  Trinity  plain  ;  but  none  have 
ever  been  found  which  did  not  make  the  Trinity  either  Sabelliau- 
ism  or  Tritheism.  They  are  either  three  parts  of  the  substance,  or 
else  three  qualities  or  modes  of  the  substance. 

Thus  we  have  instances  in  which  the  three  are  made  the  three 
parts  of  one  being,  or  substance ;  as  in  man,  —  spirit,  soul,  body ; 
thought,  affection,  will;  head,  heart,  hand. 

One  Being  with  three  distinct  faculties  is  Tritheism  :  one  Being 
acting  in  three  directions  is  Sabellianism. 

Time  is  past,  present,  and  future.  Syllogism  has  its  major,  minor, 
and  conclusion.     There  are'  other  like  analogies. 

St.  Patrick  took  for  his  illustration  the  three  leaves  of  trefoil,  or 
clover.  Others  have  imagined  the  Trinity  like  a  triangle  ;  or  they 
have  referred  to  the  three  qualities  of  space,  —  height,  breadth, 
width ;  or  of  fire,  —  form,  light,  and  heat ;  or  of  a  noun,  which  has 
its  masculine,  feminine,  and  neuter ;  or  of  a  government,  consist- 
ing of  king,  lords,  and  commons ;  or  of  executive,  legislative,  and 
judiciary. 

This  survey  of  Church  Trinity  shows  that  it  is  either  one  in 
'which,  — 

1.  The  persons  are  not  defined ;  or  an  unintelligible  Trinity. 

2.  Or  which  defines  person  and  Unity  in  the  usual  sense ;  or  a 
contradictory  Trinity. 

3.  Or  which  defines  person  as  usual,  and  the  Unity  as  only 
Union ;   or  Tritheism. 

4.  Or  which  defines  person  as  only  manifestation;  or  Sabel- 
lianism. 

These  four  are  all  the  views  ever  hitherto  given,  and  are  all  un- 
tenable. We  might  stop  here,  and  say  that  the  Trinity  is  utterly 
unsujiported.  There  is  no  need  of  going  to  the  Scripture  to  see  if 
it  is  taught  there  ;  for  we  have,  as  j^et,  nothing  to  look  for  in  Scrip- 
ture. 

The  Trinitarian's  difficulty  appears  to  be  in  defining  person.  But 
possibly  he  may  say,  "  I  cannot,  indeed,  give  a  positive  idea  of  per- 
son ;  but  I  can  give  a  negative  one.  I  cannot  say  what  it  is ;  but 
I  can  say  what  it  is  not.  It  is  not  a  mere  mode  on  the  one  hand  ; 
and  not  being,  on  the  other.  We  must  neither  confound  the  per- 
sons nor  divide  the  substance." 

We  will,  then,  go  further,  and  say,  as  Trinitarians  have  never 
yet  defined  person,  without  maldng  it  either  a  mode  or  a  being,  so 
they  never  can  define  it  otherwise.     There  is  no  third  between  be- 


APPENDIX.  497 

ing  and  mode.     They  imist  either  confound  the  persons  or  divide 
the  substance. 

Again:  that  which  differences  one  person  in  the  Deity  from 
another  must  be  either  a  perfection  or  an  imjjerfection.  There  is 
nothing  between  these.  But  it  cannot  be  an  imperfection;  for  no 
imperfection  exists  in  God :  and  it  cannot  be  a  perfection ;  for 
then  the  other  two  persons  would  want  a  divine  perfection,  and 
would  be  imperfect. 

III.  The  arguments  in  support  of  the  Trinity  are  wholly  inade- 
quate. Since,  according  to  Neander,  the  Trinity  is  not  stated  in 
the  New  Testament,  it  follows  that  it  is  a  doctrine  of  inference 
only ;  that  is,  a  piece  of  human  reasoning.  Now,  we  have,  no 
doubt,  a  perfect  right  to  infer  doctrines  from  Scripture  which  are 
not  stated  there  ;  but,  as  Protestants,  we  have  no  right  to  make 
these  inferences  fundamental,  or  essential  to  the  religious  life. 
They  may,  indeed,  be  metaphysically  essential ;  that  is,  essential 
to  a  well-arranged  system:  but  they  are  not  morally  essential; 
that  is,  not  essential  to  the  moral  and  spiritual  life  of  the  soul. 

But  this  is  just  what  Dr.  Huntington  attempts  to  do.  He 
tries  to  show  that  there  is  a  doctrine  essential  to  the  life,  peace, 
and  progress  of  man,  which  the  New  Testament  has  omitted  to 
state  ;  which  is  neither  distinctly  stated  by  our  Saviour  nor  by  any 
of  his  apostles ;  which  has  been  left  to  be  inferred,  and  inferred  by 
the  mere  processes  of  unaided  human  reason. 

What  arguments  does  he  allege  for  this  ? 

His  first  and  ])rincipal  argument  is  the  universal  belief  of  the 
Christian  Church  in  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity. 

On  this  Dr.  Huntington  lays  great  stress.     He  says,  — 

"  Truth  is  not  determined  by  inajorities ;  and  yet  it  would  be 
contrary  to  the  laws  of  our  constitution  not  to  be  affected  by  a  tes- 
timony so  vast,  uniform,  and  sacred  as  that  which  is  rendered  by 
the  common  belief  of  Christian  history  and  the  Christian  countries 
to  the  truth  of  the  Trinity.  There  is  something  extremely  painful, 
not  to  say  irreverent,  towards  the  Providence  which  has  watched 
and  led  the  true  Christian  Israel,  in  presuming  that  a  tenet  so  em- 
phatically and  gladly  received  in  all  the  ages  and  regions  of  Chris- 
tendom, as  almost  Htei'ally  to  meet  the  terms  of  the  test  of  Vincen- 
tius,  —  believed  always,  everywhere,  and  by  all,  —  is  unfounded  in 
revelation  and  truth.  Such  a  conclusion  puts  an  aspect  of  uncer- 
tainty over  the  mind  of  the  Church,  scarcely  consistent  with  any 
42  * 


498    orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

tolerable  confidence  in  that  great  promise  of  the  Master,  that  he 
would  be  with  his  own  all  days."     (p.  35.9.) 

To  which  we  answer,  — 

(1.)  That,  according  to  Dr.  Bushnell  (Dr.  Huntington's  own 
witness),  there  never  has  been,  nor  is  now,  any  such  belief  in  the 
doctrine  of  the  Trinity  as  he  asserts.  The  largest  part  of  the  Church 
have  always  "  divided  the  substance  "  of  the  Deity,  and  another 
large  portion  have  "  confounded  the  persons  ;  "  and  so  the  majority 
of  the  Church,  while  holding  the  word  "  Trinity,"  have  never  be- 
lieved in  the  Triunity  at  all. 

Dr.  Huntington  summons  Dr.  Bushnell  as  a  witness  to  the 
practical  value  of  the  Trinity ;  and  we  may  suppose  something  such 
an  examination  as  this  to  take  place :  — 

Dr.  Huntington.  Tell  us.  Dr.  Bushnell,  what  instances  you 
know  of  persons  who  have  been  converted  or  deeply  blessed  by  the 
holy  doctrine  of  the  Trinity. 

Dr.  Bushnell.  I  have  known  of  "  a  great  cloud  of  witnesses," 
''living  myriads,"  "  who  have  been  raised  to  a  participation  of  God 
in  the  faith  of  this  adorable  mystery."    (Huntington,  p.  413.) 

Dr.  H.     Mention  some  of  them. 

Dr.  B.  "Francis  Junius,"  "two  centuries  and  a  half  ago,"  — 
a  professor  "at  Heidelberg  (Leyden?).  testjfied  that  he  was,  in 
fact,  converted  from  atheism  by  the  Christian  Trinity  ;  "  also  "  the 
mild  and  sober  Howe  ;  "  "  Jeremy  Tayl ,:.r  ;  "  also  "  the  Marquis  de 
Rentz;"  "Edwards,"  and  "Lady  Maxwell."  (Huntington,  n 
414.)  '  V  5      »   h' 

Unitarian.  Say,  Dr.  Bushnell,  whether,  in  your  opinion,  the 
majority  of  Christians  really  beheve  in  the  Church  doctrine  of  the 
Trinity. 

Dr.  B.     "  A  very  large  portion  of  the  Christian  teachers,  to 
gether  with  the  general  mass  of  disciples,  undoubtedly  hold  three 
living  persons  in  the  interior  nature  of  God."    (Bushnell :  "  God  in 
Christ,"  p.  130.) 

Unit.     Is  that  scriptural  or  Orthodox  ? 

Dr.  B.  No.  It  is  only  "  a  social  Unity."  It  is  « a  celestial 
Tritheocracy."  It  "  boldly  renounces  Orthodoxy  at  the  point  op- 
posite to  Unitarianism."     (Bushnell:  "  God  in  Christ,"  p.  131.) 

Unit.  Do  I  understand  you  to  be  now  speaking  of  the  properly 
Orthodox  ministers  and  churches  generally  ? 

Dr.  B.  "  Our  properly  Orthodox  teachers  and  churches,  while 
professing  three  persons,  also  retain  the  verbal  profession  of  one 


APPENDIX.  499 

lerson.  They  suppose  themselves  really  to  hold  that  God  is  one 
lerson ;  and  yet  they  most  certainly  do  not :  they  only  confuse 
heir  understanding;,  and  call  tlicir  confusion  faith.  This  I  affirm 
m  the  ground  of  sufficient  evidence  ;  partly  because  it  cannot  be 
itherwise,  and  partly  because  it  visibly  is  not."     {Ibid.  p.  131.) 

Unit.  Do  you  believe,  Dr.  Bushnell,  that  spiritual  good  can 
!ome  from  such  a  belief  in  the  Trinity  as  you  describe  to  be  "  un- 
ioubtedl}'"  that  of  "  tlie  general  mass  of  disciples  "  ? 

Dr.  B.  "  Mournful  evidence  will  be  found  that  a  confused  and 
)alnfully  bewildered  state  is  often  produced  by  it.  They  are  prac- 
ically  at  work  in  their  thoughts  to  choose  between  the  three; 
sometimes  actually  and'  decidedly  preferring  one  to  another; 
loubting  how  to  adjust  their  mind  in  worship;  uncertain,  after, 
irhich  of  the  three  to  obey ;  turning  away,  possibly,  from  one  with 
I  feeling  of  dread  that  might  well  be  called  aversion ;  devoting 
ihemselves  to  another,  as  the  Romanist  to  his  patron  saint.  This, 
;n  fact,  is  Polytheism,  and  not  the  clear,  simple  love  of  God.  There 
is  true  love  in  it,  doubtless;  but  the  comfort  of  love  is  not  here, 
rhe  mind  is  involved  in  a  dismal  confusion,  which  we  cannot  think 
af  without  the  sincerest  pity.  No  soul  can  truly  rest  in  God,  when 
God  is  in  two  or  three,  and  these  in  such  a  sense  that  a  choice  be- 
tween them  must  be  continually  suggested."     {Ibid.  p.  134.) 

Unit.  This  state  of  mind  is  undoubtedly  that  of  the  general  mass 
of  the  disciples  '^ 

Dr.  B.     It  is.     {Ibid.  p.  130.) 

Unit.  Are  there  others,  calling  themselves  Trinitarians,  who 
hold  essentially  the  Unitarian  doctrine? 

Dr.  B.  Yes.  "  It  is  a  somewhat  curious  fact  in  theology  that 
the  class  of  teachers  who  protest  over  the  word  '  person,'  declaring 
that  they  mean  only  a  threefold  distinction,  cannot  show  that 
there  is  really  a  hair's  breadth  of  difference  between  their  doctrine 
and  the  doctrine  asserted  by  many  of  the  later  Unitarians.  They 
may  teach  or  preach  in  a  very  different  manner ;  they  probably 
do:  but  the  theoretic  contents  of  their  opinion  cannot  be  dis- 
tinguished. Thus  they  say  that  there  is  a  certain  divine  person  in 
the  man  Jesus  Christ;  but  that,  when  they  use  the  term  '  person,' 
they  mean,  not  a  person,  but  a  certain  indefinite  and  indefinable 
distinction.  The  later  Unitarians,  meantime,  are  found  asserting 
that  God  is  present  in  Christ  in  a  mysterious  and  peculiar  commu- 
nication of  his  being ;  so  that  he  is  the  living  embodiment  and  ex- 
press image  of  GocJ.     If,  now,  the  question  be  raised,  'Whf^rein 


600         orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors.  i 

does  the  indefinable  distinction  of  one  differ  from  the  mysteriou 
and  peculiar  communication  of  the  other  ?  '  or  '  How  does  it  apnea 
that  there  is"  any  difference  ? '  there  is  no  living  man,  I  am  quit 
sure,  who  can  invent  an  answer."     {Ibid.  p.  135.) 

Unit.  Is  it  not  true  that  both  of  these  views  are  sometimes  hel 
alternately  by  Trinitarians  ? 

Dr.  B.  "  Probably  there  is  a  degree  of  alternation,  or  inclinin 
from  one  side  to  the  other,  in  this  view  of  Trinity,  a5  the  min 
struggles,  now  to  embrace  one,  and  now  the  other,  of  two  incom 
patible  notions.  Some  persons  are  more  habitually  inclined  t 
hold  the  three ;  a  very  much  smaller  number,  to  hold  the  one 
(Ibid.  p.  134.) 

Unit.     But  can  they  not  hold  the  Unity  with  this  Trinity  ? 

Dr.  B.  "No  man  can  assert  three  persons,  meaning  three  con 
sciousnesses,  wills,  and  understandings,  and  still  have  any  intelli 
gent  meaning  in  his  mind,  when  he  asserts  that  they  are  ye 
one  person.  For,  as  he  now  uses  the  term,  the  very  idea  of  a  pei 
son  is  that  of  an  essential,  incommunicable  monad,  bounded  b 
consciousness,  and  vitalized  by  self-active  will ;  which  being  true 
he  might  as  well  profess  to  hold  that  three  units  are  yet  one  unit 
When  he  does  it,  his  words  will,  of  necessity,  be  only  substitutes 
for  sense."     {Ibid.  p.  131.) 

(2.)  But  suppose  that  the  belief  of  the  Church  in  the  Trinit 
was  as  universal  as  Dr.  Huntington  asserts  and  Dr.  Bushnell  de 
nies,  what  would  be  its  value  ?  His  argument  proves  too  much 
If  it  proves  the  Trinity  to  be  true,  it  proves,  a  fortiori,  the  Ro 
man  Catholic  Church  to  be  the  true  Church,  and  Protestantism  t( 
be  an  error ;  for  Martin  Luther,  at  one  time,  was  the  only  Protes. 
tant  in  the  Avorld.  Suppose  that  a  Roman  priest  had  come  to  bin: 
then.     He  might  have  addressed  him  thus  :  — 

"It  is  certainly  an  impressive  testimony  to  the  truth  of  tht 
Church  of  Rome,  that  the  Christian  world  have  been  so  generallj 
agreed  in  it.  Truth  is  not  determined  by  majorities ;  and  yet  it 
would  be  contrary  to  the  laws  of  our  constitution  not  to  be  af- 
fected by  a  testimony  so  vast,  uniform,  and  sacred  as  that  which  is 
rendered  by  the  common  belief  of  Christian  history  and  the  Chris- 
tian centuries  to  the  doctrines  and  practices  of  the  Roman  Catho- 
lic Church.  We  travel  abroad,  through  these  converted  lands, 
over  the  round  world.  We  enter,  at  the  call  of  the  Sabbath  morn- 
ing light,  the  place  of  assembled  worshi])pers  ;  let  it  be  the  newly 
planted  conventicle  on  the  edge  of  the  Western  forest,  or  the  mis- 


APPENDIX.  501 

sionary  station  at  the  extremity  of  the  Eastern  continent ;  let  it  be 
the  collection  of  Northern  mountaineers,  or  of  the  dwellers  in 
Southern  valleys  ;  let  it  be  in  the  plain  village  meeting-house, 
or  in  the  magnificent  cathedrals  of  the  old  cities ;  let  it  be  the 
crowded  congregation  of  the  metropolis,  or  the  '  two  or  three ' 
that  meet  in  faith  in  upper  chambers,  in  log-huts  or  under  palm- 
trees  ;  let  it  be  regenerate  bands  gathered  to  pray  in  the  islands 
of  the  ocean,  or  thankful  circles  of  believers  confessing  their  de- 
pendence and  beseeching  jnirdon  on  sbips'  decks,  in  the  midst  of 
the  ocean.  So  we  pass  over  the  outstretched  countries  of  both 
hemispheres;  and  it  is  -well  nigh  certain  —  so  certain  that  the  rare 
and  scattered  exceptions  drop  out  of  the  broad  and  general  con- 
clusion —  that  the  lowly  petitions,  the  fervent  supplications,  the 
hearty  confessions,  the  eager  thanksgivings,  or  the  grand  peals  of 
choral  adoration,  which  our  ears  will  hear,  will  be  uttered  accord- 
ing to  the  grand  ritual  of  the  Church  of  Home.  This  is  the  voice 
of  the  unhesitating  praise  that  embraces  and  hallows  the  globe." 

What  would  Luther  have  replied  to  that  ?  He  would  have  said, 
"  Truth  must  have  a  beginning.  It  is  always,  at  first,  in  a  mi- 
nority. The  gate  of  it  is  strait,  the  path  to  it  narrow,  and  few 
find  it.  All  reforms  ai-e,  at  the  beginning,  in  the  hands  of  a  small 
number.  If  God  and  truth  are  on  our  side,  what  do  we  care  for 
your  multitudes  ?  "     We  can  make  the  same  answer  now. 

Dr.  Huntington  proceeds  to  give  his  own  creed  in  regard  to 
the  Trinity,  —  to  state  his  own  belief 

God,  in  himself,  he  declares,  we  cannot  know  at  all.  We  know 
him  only  in  his  revelation.  "  Out  of  that  inefl'able  and  veiled  God- 
head—  the  groundwork,  if  we  may  say  so,  of  all  divine  manifesta- 
tion ;  a  theocracy  —  there  emerge  to  us,  in  revelation,  the  three 
whom  we  rightly  call  persons  —  Father,  Son,  and  Holy  Ghost." 

We  can  only  conceive  of  God,  he  says,  in  action ;  and  in  action 
we  behold  him  as  three.  But  action  and  revelation  take  place  in 
time.  The  Trinity,  therefore,  according  to  Dr.  Huntington,  is 
only  known  to  us  in  temporal  manifestation :  whether  it  exists  in 
eternity  or  not,  we  cannot  tell.  And  yet,  in  the  next  sentence,  he 
goes  on  to  say  that  "  the  Son  is  eternally  begotten  of  the  Father," 
and  "the  Holy  Ghost  proceeds  out  of  the  Father,  not  in  time;" 
which  is  the  very  thing  he  had  a  moment  before  professed  to  know 
nothing  about.  It  is  very  difficult,  therefore,  to  tell  precisely  what 
his  view  is.  With  regard  to  the  incarnation  of  the  Son,  he  is  still 
more  obscure.     He  savs  that  "  Christ  comes  forth  out  of  the  God- 


502     ORTHODOXY  :  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

head  as  the  Son ; "  that  he  "  leaves  the  glory  he  had  with  the 
Father;"  that,  while  he  is  on  earth,  the  Father  alone  represents- 
the  unseen  personality  of  the  Godhead,  and  that  therefore  the  Son 
appears  to  be  dependent  on  him,  and  submissive ;  that  temporari- 
ly, while  the  Son  is  in  the  world,  he  remains  ignorant  of  what  the 
Father  knows,  and  says  that  his  Father  is  greater  than  he.  *'  He 
lessens  himself  to  dependency  for  the  sake  of  mediation."  "  All  this 
we  might  expect."  This  he  calls  an  "  instrumental  inequality  be- 
tween Son  and  Father :  "  it  "  is  wrought  into  the  biblical  language, 
remains  in  all  our  devotional  habit,  and  ought  to  remain  there." 

In  other  words.  Dr.  Huntington  believes  that  the  Infinite  God 
became  less  than  infinite  in  the  incarnation.     The  common  expla- 
nation of  those   passages,  where  Christ  says,  for  example,  "  My 
Father  is  greater  than  I,"  does  not  satisfy  him.     He  is  not  satis- 
fied that  Jesus  said  it  "  in  his  human  nature."    No.     It  was  the 
divine  nature  which  said  it ;  and  it  was  really  GOD  THE  Son,  who 
did  not  know  the  day  nor  the  hour  of  his  own  coming.     He  lost  a 
part  of  his  omniscience.     He  ceased  to  be  perfect  in  all  his  attri-  , 
bates.     We  should  say,  then,  that  he  ceased  to  be  God ;  but  Di\  j 
Huntington  maintains  that  he  was  God,  nevertheless  ;  but  God  less  I 
than  omnipotent,  —  God  less  than  omniscient ;   God  the   Son,  so 
distinct  from  the  Father  as  to  be  ignorant  of  what  the  Father 
knew,  and  unable  to  perform  what  the  Father  could  do. 

Dr.  Huntington  (p.  366)  ascribes  it  to  "  condescension "  in 
Christ,  to  say  that  "  of  that  day  and  hour  knoweth  not  the  Son." 
"/i{  is  condescension  indeed!"  says  he.  But  this  word  "con- 
descension "  does  not  well  apply  here.  One  does  not  condescend 
to  be  ignorant  of  what  he  knows :  still  less  does  a  truthful  person 
condescend  to  say  he  is  ignorant  of  what  he  knows.  We  may  | 
wisely  condescend  to  help  the  feeble,  and  sympathize  with  the  j 
lowly,  but  hardly  to  be  ignorant  with  them,  or  to  pretend  to  be  ig- 
norant. It  is  a  badly  chosen  word,  and  seems  to  show  the  vacLl-j 
lation  of  the  writer's  thought. 

IV.  The  arguments  against  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  are  un- 
answerable. 

We  infer  that  they  are  unanswerable  from  the  fact  that  they  are 
not  answered.     It  is  to  be  presumed  that  Dr.  Huntington,  hav-^ 
ing  been  for  so  many  years  a  preacher  of  Unitarian  doctrine,  i^ 
acquainted  with  our  arguments.     It  is  a  remarkable  fact  that,  in* 
this  sermon,  he  has  nowhere  attempted  to  reply  to  them.     He  has 


APPENDIX.  503 

passed  tliem  wholly  by.  You  Avould  not  know,  from  reading  the 
discourst>,  that  he  hud  ever  been  a  Unitarian,  or  hud  ever  heard  of 
the  Unitarian  objections  to  the  Trinity ;  still  less  that  lie  had  hiin- 
self  preached  against  it.  Unitarians,  for  instance,  have  said,  tliat 
if  the  Trinity  be  true,  and  if  it  be  so  important  to  the  tvelfarc  of 
the  soul  as  is  contended,  it  wotdd  be  somewhere  plainly  taught  in 
the  New  Testamait.  Does  Dr.  Huntington  answer  this  argument? 
No ;  he  answers  the  argument  from  the  toord  "  Trinity  "  not  being 
in  the  Bible,  and  his  answer  is  sufficient ;  but  he  does  not  answer 
the  argument  from  the  fact,  that  the  doctrine  itself  is  not  anywhere 
distinctly  taught,  and  that  none  of*  the  terms  which  have  been 
found  essential  to  any  Orthodox  statement  of  the  doctrine  are  to 
be  met  with  in  the  New  Testament.* 

Nor  does  Dr.  Huntington  anywhere  fairly  meet  the  Unitarian 
argument  from  the  impossibility  of  stating  the  doctrine  in  intelligi- 
ble language.  He  tells  us,  with  his  usual  eloquence,  what  Ave  have 
often  enough  been  taught  before,  that  there  are  many  things  Avhictf' 
we  do  not  understand,  and  that  we  must  believe  many  facts  the 
mode  of  which  is  unintelligible.  But  when  we  say,  "  Can  we  be- 
lieve a  doctrine  or  proposition  which  cannot  be  distinctly  stated  ?  " 
he  has  no  answer.  The  Trinity  is  a  doctrine,  and  must  therefore 
be  distinctly  stated  in  order  to  be  believed.  It  has  not  been  dis- 
tinctly stated,!  and  therefore  cannot  be, believed.  To  this  objec- 
tion Dr.  Huntington  has  no  reply ;  and  we  may  conclude  that  it 
is  an  unanswerable  objection. 

Dr.  Huntington  uses  an  unnecessary  phrase  about  those  'who 
object  to  mystery.  He  calls  the  objection  "  shallow  self-illusion," 
and  proceeds  with  the  usual  declaration,  that  all  of  life  is  mysterious. 
Can  he  have  been  a  Unitarian  preacher  for  twenty  years,  and  not 
have  known  that  Unitarians  object  to  mystery  only  when  it  is  used 
by  Trinitarians  as  a  cover  for  obscurity.and  vagueness  of  statement  ? 

*  "  It  has  often  been  asserted  and  admitted,"  says  Twcsten,  one  of  the 
stronfjest  of  modern  Trinitarians,  "  that  even  the  principal  notions  about 
wlueh  the  Church  doctriue  turns  are  foreign  to  tJie  New  Testament;  as  ovaia 
and  vni'.aracti,  Ti-dmis  vTrai^^cws  wad ixTTOKaXiipeios,  rpidjand  o/iooOaia."  (Twesten: 
Dogmatik,  vol.  ii.  p.  281.) 

t  "  Who  will  venture  to  say  that  any  of  the  definitions  heretofore  given  of 
personality  in  the  Godhead,  in  itself  considered,— such  definitions  as  Iiave 
their  basis  in  the  Xicene  or  Athanasian  Creed,  —  are  intelligible  and  satis- 
factory to  the  mind  ?  At  least,  I  can  truly  say,  that  I  have  not  been  able  to 
find  them,  if  they  do  in  fact  exist;  nor,  so  far  as  I  know,  has  any  one  been 
able,  by  any  commentary  on  them,  to  make  them  clear  and  satisfactory." 
(I'rof.  Stuart,  Biblical  Repository,  April,  1835.  See  Wilson,  Trin.  Test.,  p.  272.> 


504     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

You  ask  us  to  believe  a  precise  statement,  viz.,  that  "there  are 
three  j^ersons  in  the  Godhead."  We  say,  "  What  do  you  mean  by 
*  person '  ?  "  The  Trinitarian  answers,  "  It  is  a  mystery."  We 
say,  "  We  cannot  believe  it,  then."  The  Trinitarian  replies, 
"  Why,  all  is  a  mystery.  How  the  grass  grows  is  a  mystery  ;  yet 
you  believe  it."  "  No,"  we  say,  "  we  do  not  believe  it.  When 
the  mj'stery  begins,  our  belief  ends  ;  we  believe  up  to  that  point, 
and  no  farther."  The  statement,  "  the  grass  grows,"  is  not  a 
mystery  ;  the  fact,  "  the  grass  grows,"  is  not  a  mystery.  We 
believe  the  fact  and  the  statement.  The  way  in  which  it  grows  is 
mysterious ;  and  we  do  not  believe  anything  about  it.  "  You  can- 
not understand  how  the  grass  grows."  No  ;  and,  accordingly,  we 
do  not  believe  anything  about  hoiv  the  grass  grows.  But  the 
whole  purpose  of  the  Trinity  is  to  show  hoia  the  Father,  the  Son, 
and  the  Holy  Spirit  exist.  You  are  not  satisfied  that  we  receive 
what  the  Scripture  teaches ;  you  try  to  show  us  the  how,  and  then 
leave  it  in  obscurity  at  last. 

Nor  does  Dr.  Huntington  reply  to  the  Unitarian  explanation  of 
the  TVinitarian  proof-texts.  Trinitarians  have  often  quoted  the 
texts  —  "land  my  Father  are  one ; "  " He  who  has  seen  me  has 
seen  the  Father  "  —  in  proof  of  the  Deity  of  Christ.  Unitarians 
have  often  replied  to  both  of  them :  to  the  first  passage,  that  since 
Jesus  has  also  said  that  hij  disciples  ivere  to  he  one  ivith  him,  as  he 
is  one  with  Ood,  it  either  proves  that  the  disciples  are  also  to  be 
God,  or  does  not  prove  that  Christ  is  God.  To  the  second  pas- 
sage, Unitarians  have  replied  by  reading  the  next  clause,  in  which 
Christ  says,  "  Believest  thou  not  that  I  am  in  the  Father  ?  "  show- 
ing how  it  is  that  he  reveals  the  Father.  He  is  in  the  Father,  and 
his  disciples  are  in  him.  Those  who  see  him,  see  the  Father ; 
those  Avho  see  his  true  disciples,  see  the  face  and  image  of  Christ. 
These  answers  are  so  obviops,  and  Dr.  Huntington  must  have 
heard  them  so  often,  that  he  should,  as  a  controversialist,  have 
taken  some  notice  of  them.     He  has  not  done  so. 

He  quotes  the  passage  from  Eph.  1  :  20,  21,  and  says,  "  Can 
this  be  a  creature'? "  We  reply,  "Can  he  be  anything  btit  a 
creature  ?  —  he  who  was  set  by  God  in  this  place  of  honor.  Does 
God  set  God,  as  a  reward,  above  principalities  and  powers  ?  Does 
God  make  God  "  head  over  all  things  in  the  Church  "  ?  Again  : 
Dr.  Huntington  quotes,  '*  that,  at  the  name  of  Jesus,  every  knee 
should  bow,  and  every  tongue  confess  that  he  is  Lord ;  "  but  he 
omits  the  conclusion,  "  to  the  glory  of  God  the  Father." 


APPENDIX.  505 

He  even  quotes  the  passage,  "Him  hath  God  exalted  to  give 
repentance  and  forgiveness  of  sin." 

And  he  quotes  the  passage,  which  has  staggered  the  strongest 
believers  in  the  Trinity,  where  Paul  declares  (1  Cor.  ch.  15),  that,  at 
the  end,  Christ  will  give  up  his  kingdom  to  the  Father,  that  "  God 
may  be  all  in  all,"  and  explains  it  as  meaning  that  "  he  will  resume 
his  place  in  the  coequal  Three,  the  indivisible  One."  Has  he  left 
his  place,  then?  Is  that  Orthodox?  Dr.  Huntington  evidently 
thinks  so;  for  he  says,  "The  Son,  in  his  character  of  Sonship,  is 
retaken,  so  to  speak,  into  the  everlasting  undivided  One."  So  to 
k-peak.  "We  may  speak  so  :  "  But  what  do  we  mean  by  it?  "  is  the 
question.  Did  God  the  Son  leave  his  place  in  the  Godhead  ?  Did 
he  become  less  than  God  ?  Did  he  become  ignorant  ?  Did  he  suffer 
and  die  ?  Did  he  arise,  and  at  last  reascend,  and  take  his  place,  "  so 
to  speak,"  in  the  Godhead  ?  If  this  is  meant  as  real  statement, 
what  better  is  it  than  the  Avatars  of  Vishnu  ?  What  sort  of  Unity 
is  left  to  us  ?  We  have  a  Trinity  of  council ;  but  where  is  the  Unity, 
except  of  agreement  ?  One  divine  Being  descending,  and  leaving 
the  other  divine  Being  alone,  temporarily,  on  the  throne  of  the  uni- 
verse, until  the  divine  Being  w-ho  had  descended  should  reascend 
to  take  his  seat  again  "  in  the  coequal  Three  and  indivisible  One  " ! 

One  Unitarian  argument,  which  appears  to  us  unanswerable,  is 
in  the  fact,  that  the  very  passages  in- which  the  highest  attributes 
are  ascribed  to  Christ  are  always  those  in  which  his  dependence 
and  subordination  are  most  strongly  asserted.  We  could  throw 
aside  all  the  passages  in  which  Jesus  asserts  directly  his  inferiori- 
ty, —  as,  "  My  Father  is  greater  than  I ;  "  "  Of  mine  own  self  I 
can  do  nothing,"  —  and  take  the  strongest  proof-texts  of  the 
Trinitarians,  and  ask  for  no  better  proof  for  the  Unitarian  doctrine  : 
"  All  power  is  given  to  me  in  heaven  and  earth  ;  "  "  The  image  of 
the  invisible  God,  the  first-born  of  every  creature  ;"  "  In  him  dwelt 
all  the  fulness  of  the  Godhead  bodily."  Are  these  passages  written 
of  Christ  in  his  divine  or  human  nature  ?  Xot  his  divine  nature  ;  for 
to  God  the  Son  all  power  cannot  be  "  given."  God  the  Son  cannot 
be  "  the  image  of  God,"  or  the  "  first-born  of  every  creature."  The 
"  fulness  of  the  Godhead  "  cannot  dwell  in  God  the  Son.  They  must, 
then,  be  said  of  him  in  his  human  nature  ;  and,  if  so,  they  show 
that  the  loftiest  titles  and  attributes  do  not  prove  him  to  be  God.- 

V.  The  good  ascribed  to  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  does  not 
belong  to  it,  but  to  the  truths  which  underlie  it. 
43 


506     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

Dr.  Huntington  asserts,  for  example,  that  "  the  Triunity  of  God 
appears  to  be  the  necessary  means  of  manifesting  and  supporting, 
in  the  mind  of  our  race,  a  faith  in  the  true  personality  of  God." 

If  so,  it  is  remarkable  that  the  two  forms  of  religion  in  which 
tho  personality  of  God,  as  absolute  will,  is  most  distinctly  rec- 
ognized (i.  8.,  the  Jewish  religion  and  the  Mohammedan  rehgion), 
should  both  be  ignorant  of  the  Trinity.  It  is  equally  remarkable 
that  the  most  Pantheistic  religion  in  the  world,  in  which  the  per- 
conality  of  God  most  entirely  disappears  (i.  e.,  Bramiuism),  should 
have  a  Trinity  of  its  own.  It  is  also  remarkable,  on  this  hypothesis, 
that  idolatry  in  the  Christian  Church  (as  worship  of  Mary,  worship 
of  saints  and  relics,  &c.)  should  come  up  with  the  Trinity,  and 
flourish  simultaneously  with  it. 

No  ;  it  is  not  the  Trinity  which  brings  out  most  distinctly  the 
personality  of  God,  but  the  faith  in  a  divine  revelation  through  in- 
spired men.  If  God  can  dwell  in  the  souls  of  men,  teaching  and 
guiding  them,  he  must  be  a  person  like  the  soul  with  which  he 
communes.  Especially  does  the  religious  consciousness  of  Jesus, 
his  simple  and  child-like  communion  with  the  heavenly  Father, 
bring  God  near  to  the  soul  as  a  personal  being.  It  is  not  the 
Trinity,  but  the  Christian  faith  which  underlies  it,  which  teaches 
the  divine  personality. 

Nor  is  it  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  which  is  necessary  for  a 
living  faith  in  God  thi-ough  Christ,  reconciling  the  world  unto  him- 
self. All  that  Dr.  Huntington  says  of  the  evil  of  sin  is  well  said, 
but  has  no  bearing  on  the  point  before  us.  According  to  Dr. 
Huntington's  own  witnesses,  as  we  have  seen  above,  the  Trinity 
was  unknown  in  the  earlier  ages  of  the  Church.  Was  reconcilia- 
tion unknown  ?  Was  the  forgiving  love  of  Christ  unknown  ?  If 
he  cannot  assert  this,  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  is  not  necessary 
to  a  living  faith  in  a  reconciling  God. 

Dr.  Huntington  argues,  that  only  the  sufferings,  and  actual 
sufferings,  of  God  himself,  can  touch  the  sinful  heart ;  and,  there- 
fore, the  Trinity  is  true.  The  conclusion  is  a  long  way  from  the 
premise,  even  supposing  that  to  be  sound.  But  as  regards  the 
premise,  he  has  read  and  quoted  ManseL  Has  he  not  verged  to- 
wards the  dogmatism  which  that  writer  condemns  ?  Would  it  not 
be  more  modest,  and  better  accord  with  Christian  humility,  to  be 
satisfied  with  believing  the  scriptural  assertions,  that  "God  so 
loved  the  world,  that  he  gave  his  only-begotten  Son  ;  "  that  "  He 
who  spared  not  his  own  Son,  but  gave  him  up  for  us  all,  —  shall 


APPENDIX.  507 

he  not,  with  him,  freely  jjive  us  all  things  ?  "  Is  not  this  enough, 
■without  an  argument  to  prove  that  the  only  way  by  Avhich  man 
can  be  saved  is  the  method  of  a  suftering  God? 

We  will  not  dwell  further  on  this  head,  nor  examine  our  friend's 
argument  to  show  that  we  cannot  consistently,  as  Unitarians,  have 
any  piety.     We  will  try,  then,  to  have  it  inconsistently. 

VI.  Great  evils  to  the  Church  have  come  from  the  doctrine  of 
the  Trinity. 

It  has  tended  to  the  belief  in  three  Gods,  It  has  tended  to  a 
confusion  of  belief  between  three  Gods  of  equal  power  and  majesty, 
united  only  in  counsel ;  one  supreme  and  two  inferior  Deities  ; 
one  Deity  with  a  threefold  manner  of  manifestation  ;  and  a  vague, 
undetermined  use  of  words,  with  no  meaning  attached  to  them  — 
unhappy  confusion,  which  none  have  been  more  ready  to  recognize 
and  to  point  out  than  Trinitarians  themselves. 

And  what  shall  we  say  of  the  continual  struggles,  conflicts,  and 
bitter  controversies,  which  this  doctrine  has  caused  from  the  time 
of  its  entrance  into  the  Church?  What  is  there  more. disgraceful 
in  the  history  of  the  Church,  than  the  mutual  persecutions  of 
Arians  and  Athanasians,  and  of  all  the  minor  sects  and  parties-, 
engendered  by  this  disputed  doctrine  ? 

This  is  what  Dr.  Bushnell  says  of  one  of  these  matters ;  and  his 
testimony  is,  perhaps,  sufficient  on  this  point,  — 

"  No  man  can  assert  three  persons,  — meaning  three  conscious- 
nesses, wills,  and  understandings,  —  and  still  have  any  intelligent 
meaning  in  his  mind,  when  he  asserts  that  they  are  yet  one  per- 
son ;  for,  as  he  now  uses  the  term,  the  very  idea  of  a  person  is 
that  of  an  essential,  incommunicable  monad,  bounded  by  conscious- 
ness, and  vitalized  by  self-active  will ;  which  being  true,  he  might 
as  well  profess  to  hold  that  three  units  are  yet  one  unit.  When  he 
does  it,  his  words  will,  of  necessity,  be  only  substitutes  for  sense. 

"  At  the  same  time,  there  are  too  many  signs  of  the  mental  con- 
fusion I  speak  of  not  lio  believe  that  it  exists.  Thus,  if  the  class  I 
speak  of  were  to  hear  a  discourse  insisting  on  the  proper  personal 
Unity  of  God,  it  would  awaken  suspicion  in  their  minds,  while  a 
discourse  insisting  on  the  existence  of  three  persons  Avould  be  only 
a  certain  proof  of  Orthodoxy;  showing  that  they  profess  three 
persons,  meaning  what  they  profess,  and  one  person,  really  not 
meaning  it. 

"  Such  is  the  confusion  produced  by  attempting  to  assert  a  real 
and  metaphysical  Trinity  of  persons  in  the  divine  nature.  Whether 


508         orthodoxy:  its  truths  and  errors. 

the  word  is  taken  at  its  full  import,  or  diminished  away  to  a  mere 
something  called  a  distinction,  there  is  produced  only  contrariety, 
confusion,  practical  negation,  not  light." 

So  far  Dr.  Bushnell.  On  another  point  thus  testifies  Twesten  :  — 
"  There  are  many  to  whom  the  biblical  and  religious  basis  of 
the  doctrine  is  exceeding  sure  and  precious,  who  are  dissatisfied 
with  the  Church  form  of  the  doctrine,  and  even  feel  themselves 
repelled  or  fettered  by  it.  It  is  to  them  more  negative  than  posi- 
tive, more  opposed  to  errors  than  giving  any  insight  into-  truth. 
It  solves  no  difficulty,  it  unseals  no  new  revelation." 

Twesten  goes  on  to  admit  that  the  Trinity  has  really  hemmed  in 
the  free  movement  of  the  mind,  substituting  a  dead  uniformity  for 
a  manifold  and  various  life  ;  and  yet  Twesten  is  a  very  strong  and 
able  Trinitarian. 

VII.  The  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  is  a  doctrine  of  philosophy,  and 
not  of  faith. 

As  philosophy,  it  might  be  ever  so  true  and  important ;  but, 
when  brought  forward  as  religion  (as  Dr.  Huntington  has  done), 
it  would  become  at  once  pernicious.  To  offer  theology  for  i-eligion, 
belief  for  faith,  philosophy  born  of  speculative  reflection  in  place 
of  spiritual  insight  and  pious  experience,  have  always  been  most 
deleterious  both  to  religion  and  to  philosophy. 

The  objects  of  faith  are  the  Father,  the  Son,  and  the  Holy  Spirit. 
Through  Christ  we  have  access  to  the  Father  in  the  Spirit.  We 
see  the  Father  revealed  to  us  in  the  Son ;  we  feel  the  power  of  the 
Spirit  in  our  hearts.  This  is  religion  ;  but  this  has  nothing  to  do 
with  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity. 

VIII.  We  can  trace  the  gradual  formation  of  the  doctrine  in  the 
Christian  Church. 

The  following  facts  we  suppose  to  be  incontrovertible :  — 

1.  Down  to  the  time  of  the  synod  of  Nice  (A.  D.  325),  the  Son 
was  considered  to  be  subordinate,  or  inferior  to  the  Father,  by  the 
great  majority  of  writers  and  teachers  in  the  Christian  Church,  and 
by  the  multitude  of  believers  ;  and  no  doctrine  of  Trinity  existed 
in  the  Church. 

2.  The  Nicene  symbol,  which  declared  Christ  to  be  "  God  from 
God,  Light  from  Light,  true  God  from  true  God,  of  the  same  sub- 
stance with  the  Father,"  *  was  directed  against  the  two  Arian  posi- 

*  See  the  creed  ia  Hagenbach  (History  of  Doct.,  vol.  i.  p.  2C8) :  "  Omv 
Ik  0£ov,  <pwi  Ik  0cords,  Qeuv  d\riOivdv  ck  Qcov  dXrjdtpov." 


APPENDIX.  509 

tions, — that  Christ  was  created,  and  that  there  was  a  time  when 
he  did  not  exist ;  but  it  did  not  declare  his  equality  with  God  the 
Father,  nor  teach  the  personality  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  nor  say  any- 
thing of  the  Trinity. 

3.  The  councils  vacillated  to  and  fro  during  three  hundred 
years,  gradually  tending  towards  the  present  Church  doctrine  of 
the  Trinity  ;  thus,  — 

1.  Synod  of  Xice  (A.  D.  325)  opposed  the  Arian  doctrine  of 
the  creation  of  Christ  out  of  nothing,  and  maintained  that  his  sub- 
stance  was  derived  from  that  of  God. 

2.  S>/nocl  of  Tyre  (A.  D.  33<5)  favored  the  Avians,  and  deposed 
Athanasius. 

3.  Council  of  Antiocli  (A.  D.  343)  opposed  the  views  of  the 
Arians,  and  also  the  views  of  their  opponents. 

4.  Council  of  Sardica  (A.  1).  344)  resulted  in  a  division  between 
the  Eastern  and  Western  Churches  —  the  East  being  semi-Arian, 
and  the  West,  Athanasian  —  in  their  view  of  the  nature  of  Christ. 

5.  The  Western  Church  tending  to  Sabellianism  (taught  by 
Marcellus  and  his  pupil  Photinus),  this  view  was  condemned  by 
two  councils  in  the  East  and  West,  viz. :  — 

Second  council  of  Antioch  (A.  D.  343). 
Council  of  Milan  (A.  D.  346). 

6.  Constantius,  an  Arian  emperor,  endeavored  to  make  the 
Western  Churches  accept  the  Arian  doctrine,  and,  at  two  synods 
(A.  D.  353  and  355,  at  Arelate  and  Mediolanum),  compelled  the 
bishops  to  sign  the  condemnation  of  Athanasius,  deposing  those 
who  refused  so  to  do. 

7.  The  Arians,  being  thus  dominant,  immediately  divided  into 
Arians  and  Semi-Arians,  —  the  distinction  being  the  famous  dis- 
tinction between  o  and  oi.  Both  parties  denied  the  Homoousios ; 
but  the  Semi-Arians  admitted  the  Homoiousios. 

8.  At  the  synod  of  Ancyra  (A.  D.  358),  the  Semi-Arian  doctrine 
was  adopted,  and  the  Arian  rejected.  The  third  synod  of  Sirmium 
(A.  D.  358)  did  the  same  thing. 

9.  Down  to  this  time  (A.  D.  360),  nothing  was  said  about  the 
Holy  Spirit  in  its  relation  to  the  Trinity.  The  Emperor  Valens,  an 
Arian,  persecuted  the  Athanasians  from  A.  D.  364  to  378.  Then 
Theodosius,  an  Athanasian  emperor,  persecuted  the  Arians.  Semi- 
Arianism,  however,  continued  Orthodox  in  the  East. 

10.  The  Nestorian  controversy  broke  out  A.  D.  430.  Council 
of  Ephesus  (A.  D.  431)  condemned  Nestor.     The  Nestorians  (who 

43* 


510  ORTHODOXY:    ITS   TRUTHS    AND   ERRORS. 

were  Unitarians)  separated  entirely  from  the  Church,  and  became 
the  Church  of  the  Persian  empire. 

11.  The  Monophysite  controversy  broke  out.  The  council  of 
Chalcedon  (A.  D.  451)  decided  that  there  were  two  natures  in 
Christ ;  and  the  Monophysites  sepai-ated,  and  formed  the  Coptic 
Church.  Their  formula  was,  that  "  God  was  crucified  in  Christ." 
The  Nestorians  were  too  Unitarian,  and  the  Monophysites  too 
Athanasian.  The  Church  decided  (against  the  Nestorians)  that 
Mary  was  God's  mother,  but  decided  (against  the  Monophysites) 
that  God  Avas  not  crucified. 

12.  First  Lateran  Council  was  called  (in  A.  D.  640)  to  settle  a 
new  point.  It  having  been  decided  that  there  were  two  natures  in 
Christ,  it  was  now  thought  best  by  many  to  yield  to  the  Monophy- 
sites—  that  there  was  only  one  will  in  Christ.  Hence  the  Mon- 
otheletic  controversy,  finally  settled  at  the,  — 

13.  Sixth  General  Council  (A.  D.  680),  when  two  wills  in  Christ 
were  accepted  as  the  doctrine  of  the  Church. 

Thus  it  appears  that  it  took  the  Church  from  A.  D.  325  to  A.  D. 
680  to  settle  the  questions  concerning  the  relation  of  Christ  to  God. 
During  all  this  time,  opinion  vacillated  between  Arianism  on  the 
one  hand  and  Sabellianism  on  the  other.  At  the  end  of  this 
period,  the  Church  had  become  consolidated,  and  strong  enough  to 
compel  submission  to  its  opinions :  but  the  relation  of  the  Holy 
Spirit  to  the  Trinity  remained  unsettled  for  several  centuries  more; 
and  finally  the  Eastern  Church  separated  altogether  from  the 
Western  Church  on  this  point.  The  whole  Greek  Church  remains, 
to  this  day,  separated  from  the  Latin  Church  on  a  question  belong- 
ing to  this  very  doctrine  of  the  Trinity.  So  much,  then,  for  Dr. 
Huntington's  assertion,  that  the  Trinity  is  a  doctrine  which  can 
almost  literally  be  said  to  have  been  believed  "  always,  everywhere, 
and  by  aU." 

IX.  The  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  is  opposed  to  the  real  divinity 
of  Christ  and  to  his  real  humanity  ;  thus  undermining  continually 
the  faith  of  the  Church  in  the  divine  humanity  of  Jesus  Christ  the 
Lord. 

Our  final  and  chief  objection  to  the  Trinity  is,  not  that  it  makes 
Christ  divine,  but  that  it  does  not  make  him  so.  It  substitutes  for 
the  divinity  of  the  Father,  the  Supreme  God,  which  Unitarians 
believe  to  dwell  in  Christ,  a  subordinate  divinity  of  God  the  Son. 
This  is  subordinate,  because  derived ;  and,  because  derived,  de- 


APPENDIX.  511 

pendent.  The  Son  may  be  said  to  be  "  eternally  generated  ;  "  but 
this  is  only  an  eternal  derivation,  and  does  not  alter  the  depend- 
ence, but  makes  it  also  to  be  eternal.  The  tendency  of  the  Church 
doctrine  of  the  Trinity  is  always  to  a  belief,  not  in  the  supreme 
divHuity  dwelling  in  Clnist,  but  in  a  derived  and  secondary  divinity. 

How  is  it,  for  example,  with  the  Nicene  doctrine  concerning 
Christ?    Dr.  Huntington  claims  Nice  as  Trinitarian,    (p.  3G1.) 

But  what  says  Prof.  Stuart  concerning  the  Nicene  doctrine? 
Listen. 

"  The  Nicene  symbol  presents  the  Father  as  the  Monas,  or 
proper  Godliead,  in  and  of  himself  exclusively ;  it  represents  him 
as  the  Fons  ct  Principium  of  the  Son,  and  therefore  gives  him 
superior  power  and  glory.  It  does  not  even  assert  the  claims  of' 
the  blessed  Spirit  to  Godhead,  and  therefore  leaves  room  to  doubt 
whether  it  means  to  recognize  a  Trinity,  or  only  a  Duality." 
(Moses  Stuart,  Bib.  Repos.,  1835,  quoted  by  Wilson,  Trin.  Test., 
p.  264.) 

And  how  is  it  with  the  ante-Nicene  fathers,  whom  Dr.  Hun- 
tington also  considers  to  be  Trinitarian  ?  else  certainly  his  rule  of 
"  always,  everywhere,  and  by  all,"  does  not  hold.  If,  for  the  first 
three  hundred  years  after  Christ,  there  were  no  Trinitarians,  it 
cannot  be  said  that  the  Trinity  has  "  always  "  been  held  in  the 
Church.  Listen,  again,  to  Prof.  Stuart,  whose  learning  no  one 
can  question. 

"  We  find  that  all  the  Fathers  before,  at,  and  after  the  Council 
of  Nice,  who  harmonize  with  the  sentiments  there  avowed,  declare 
the  Father  only  to  be  the  self-existent  God."  (See  the  whole  para- 
graph in  Wilson,  Trin.  Test.,  p.  267.) 

"  To  be  the  author  of  the  proper  substance  of  the  Son  and  Spirit, 
according  to  the  Patristical  creed ;  or  to  be  the  author  of  the 
modus  existendi  of  the  Son  and  Spirit,  according  to  the  modern 
creed,  —  both  seem  to  involve  the  idea  of  power  and  glory  in  the 
Father,  immeasurahhj  above  that  of  the  Son  and  Spirit."  (Moses 
Stuart,  Bib.  Repos.,  1835.) 

So  Coleridge  asserts  that  "  both  Scripture  and  the  Nicene  Creed 
teach  a  subordination  of  the  Son  to  the  Father,  independent  of 
the  incarnation  of  the  Son.  .  .  .  Christ,  speaking  of  himself  as  the 
coeternal  Son,  says,  '  My  Father  is  greater  than  I.' "  (Wilson, 
Trin.  Test.,  p.  270.) 

According  to  the  Trinitarian  doctrine,  then,  we  do  not  find 
God  —  the  Supreme  God,  our  heavenly  Father  —  in  Christ ;  but  a 


512     ORTHODOXY:  ITS  TRUTHS  AND  ERRORS. 

derived,  subordinate,  and  inferior  Deity.  Not  the  one  universal 
Parent  do  we  approach,  but  some  mj^sterious,  derived,  insci'utable 
Deity,  less  than  the  Father,  and  distinct  from  him.  Do  we  not, 
then,  lose  the  benefit  and  blessing  of  the  divinity  of  Jesus  ?  Can 
we  believe  him  when  he  says,  "  He  who  has  seen  me  has  seen  the 
Father  "  ?  No  ;  we  do  not  believe  that,  if  we  ai-e  Trinitarians  ;  but 
rather,  that,  having  seen  him,  we  have  seen  "  THE  Son  ;  "  whom 
Coleridge  declares  to  be  an  inferior  Deity ;  over  whom  Bishop 
Pearson,  in  his  "  Exposition  of  the  Creed,"  says,  the  Father  holds 
"  preeminence,"  —  the  Father  being  "  the  Origin,  the  Cause,  the 
Author,  the  Root,  the  Fountain,  the  Head,  of  the  Sou."  The 
doctrine  of  the  Trinity  is  therefore  opposed,  as  Swedenborg  ably 
contends,  to  the  real  divinity  of  Christ.* 

But  it  is  equally  opposed  to  his  real  Immanity.  It  constantly 
drives  out  of  the  Church  the  human  element  in  Christ.  Dr. 
Huntington  -is  astonished  at  Unitarians  not  perceiving  that  the 
humanity  of  Christ  is  as  dear  to  Trinitarians  as  his  Deity  ;  yet  it 
cannot  be  denied,  that  the  mysterious  dogma  of  deity  has  quite 
overshadowed  the  simple  human  life  of  our  dear  Lord,  so  that  the 
Church  has  failed  to  see  the  Son  of  man.  All  his  highest  human 
traits  become  unreal  in  the  light  of  this  doctrine  of  his  deity.  He  is 
tempted  ;  but  that  is  unreal,  for  God  cannot  be  tempted.  He 
prays,  "  Our  Father  ; "  but  this  also  is  no  real  prayer,  for  he  is 
omnipotent,  and  can  need  nothing.  He  encounters  opposition, 
hatred,  contumely,  and  bears  it  with  sweetest  composure  ;  but 
what  of  that?  since,  as  God,  he  looked  down  from  an  infinite 
height  upon  the  puny  opposition.  He  agonizes  in  the  garden ; 
but  it  is  imaginai'y  suff'ering :  how  can  God  feel  any  real  agony, 
like  man  ?  Jesus  ceases  to  be  example,  ceases  to  be  our  best 
beloved  companion  and  brother,  and  becomes  a  mysterious  per- 
sonage, inscrutable  to  our  thought,  and  far  removed  from  our 
sympathy. 

*  Thus  speaks  Dr.  Bushnell  on  tliis  head  ("  God  in  Christ,"  p.  139)  :  — 
"  Besides,  it  is  another  source  of  mental  confusion,  connected  with  this  view 
of  three  metaphysical  persons,  that,  though  they  arc  all  declared  to  be  infinite 
and  equal,  they  really  are  not  so.  The  proper  deity  of  Christ  is  not  held  in 
this  view.  He  is  begotten,  sent,  supported,  directed,  by  the  Father,  in  such  a 
sense  as  really  annihilates  his  deity.  This  has  been  shown  in  a  truly  search- 
ing: and  convincing  manner  by  Schleiermachcr,  in  his  historical  essay  on  the 
Trinity;  and,  indeed,  you  will  see  at  a  glance,  that  this  view  of  a  metaphysical 
Trinity  of  persons  breaks  down  in  the  very  point  which  is  commonly  regarded 
as  its  excellence — its  asocrtion  of  the  proper  deity  of  Clirist," 


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